A Sort of Homecoming
by Dandesun
Summary: A rewrite of Todd's return to Llanview in 2011. Several things are altered from canon but this is an exploration of Todd and Blair's reconnection with various other characters chiming in.
1. Chapter 1

"My sister is stubborn on a good day, she refuses to accept the concept that Victor is trouble."

"Perhaps she enjoys that aspect of him? You missed a fairly large chunk of her life, my friend, you cannot know the things she prefers based on when she was a little girl."

"Have you still got your ear to the ground?"

"The regular avenues are not going to work this time. I am using all my resources and all I can say for sure is that something is brewing. I fear it is too late to attempt an extraction at this time. The most you can hope for is to stop what is likely to occur and that means you have to be unavailable to all while you shadow Victor."

"Which is why I'm currently camped out here. My son is going to be less than thrilled with me."

"You have time yet with him. Victor's moments are numbered."

"I've got something... comm down."

* * *

Victor rolled his eyes as he left the message on Shawn's voicemail. He didn't think anything Blair had to say was worth listening to but if he didn't at least go through the motions he'd never hear the end of it. It wasn't as if she was concerned about him anyway. All she cared about was Todd. He tried to feel bad about that... or about the concept that when he was Todd she should have been most concerned about him.

Blair had made her choice at the premiere. She never said anything but he knew she had missed the original face even when she professed her love to him. But in the recent years, their connection had dissipated. His connection to Todd's memories had dissipated. Perhaps it was the execution that broke the programming because after that things started changing, slowly at first, and then more quickly in recent years.

Victor truly did not feel a connection to Todd's life the way he once had. Tea had been right... they had a future together full of possibilities that didn't hinge on anything regarding Todd Manning.

That noise behind him caught his attention again. He turned to look into the cold eyes of Agent Baker. Baker's arm rose swiftly and pointed a 9mm pistol at Victor's chest.

The wet sound of flesh being ripped through... then again... seemed to echo through the foyer.

Victor watched in stunned silence as Baker crumpled to the floor, a pool of blood spreading out from under his body, lifeless eyes staring into nothing. He stepped forward and kicked the gun from Baker's hand then looked up towards the open doorway and out into the rain. Moments turned into minutes and suddenly, Tomas appeared in the doorway, two handguns at the ready and a rifle strapped to his back.

"Step away from the body," he ordered, moving swiftly in and making a quick sweep of the foyer and living room. Victor stepped back as Tomas holstered one weapon and bent down to check Baker's pulse. He straightened and raised one hand to his ear. "Comm up. Baker is down as is his back-up. We need a clean up crew. And someone needs to find Todd and Irene Manning."

Tomas looked at Victor and held up two fingers. "That's twice I've saved your ass now."

* * *

Blair tried to calm herself as she drove through the rain up Llantano Mountain. She glanced at the gun sitting in the passenger seat and tried to wipe the image of the very dead Irene from her mind. There were more important things to deal with right now and the absolute top of her list was finding Todd.

She had already been heading to Viki's cabin when her phone had sputtered to life with a brief blip from the land-line there. It could only have been Todd and she brushed the back of her hand against her forehead in anxiety as she maneuvered her way up the mountain roads in the downpour.

There was no car in the driveway but Blair didn't let that deter her. Knowing Todd, he probably ditched it somewhere nearby and made the rest of the way to the cabin on foot. She leapt out of the car and tore into the house to find Todd lying on the floor, lifeless, in a pool of blood.

"Oh God," she cried, rushing over to him. "Oh God, no... Todd!"

* * *

Tea nestled safely in Victor's arms and just listened to his heartbeat. She had no idea how much time had passed since she got home to find the grisly scene and her husband and brother right in the thick of it. She didn't much care as she held onto Victor. So close... she had come so close to losing him. Tomas had been infuriatingly sparse in regards to giving any information. The hardware he was packing was impressive, though. Danielle was tucked under his other arm as they sat quietly on the couch in the living room. Once forensics had given them the okay, they pushed the couch away from Baker's body and camped out there waiting for further news.

Baker's body as well as the two other men that had been a part of his team had already been taken off the premises. The large stain he had left behind, however, was difficult to look away from. Tea shuddered thinking how close they all came to that stain being all that was left of Victor. She held him tighter, squeezing her eyes shut, and he dropped a kiss on her head seeming to understand her turmoil.

He was unusually quiet, simply watching Tomas standing sentinel in the doorway. Tea wondered if he was trying to come up with a way to thank her brother without it being obvious.

John McBain came striding through the door, taking in everything with a quick cursory glance around the room. "Exciting night," he said dryly. He looked at Victor. "You okay?"

Victor nodded shortly.

"Well, assassination attempts and setting up safehouses has required me to be elsewhere until now. Starr, Jack, Sam and Hope are all at home with three of my best guys on them although I doubt they're targets at the moment." John considered the spot where Baker had died. "Irene Manning is dead."

Victor and Tea started at that. Tomas inclined his chin slightly out of interest.

"Dead how?" Victor asked.

"Shot in the chest with her own gun and bled out," John replied, almost cheerfully. "I even have an eyewitness to what happened. He's tucked safely away until further notice. Now, I have a question for everyone here. Has anyone seen or heard from Todd Manning?"

Eyes met eyes at everyone silently tried to gauge the reactions of everyone else.

"Not since earlier today," Tea said quietly. "We're not exactly on the best of terms."

"Did Todd kill my mother?" Victor asked.

"How about Blair," John asked. "Anyone seen her lately?"

Again, eyes met eyes for a moment of quiet, mutual contemplation. Finally Tea sighed. "If Blair's not with her kids then she's either looking for Todd or she's with him."


	2. Chapter 2

Blair scowled darkly at the floor of the cabin. It just figured that Viki would have absolutely no alcohol to speak of but every cleaning agent known to man. She scrubbed away at the blood on the floor until she knew she wasn't going to get it any cleaner.

"I could really use a drink," she muttered as she put the bucket and brush aside. "I could use a whole lot of them."

"Me too," a small voice replied from the couch.

Blair moved over to him and laid her hand on his forehead. A whisper of a smile touched his lips at her touch but she frowned. He was warm to the touch but still clammy. None of this was a good sign. Neither was the feverish argument Todd had engaged in with an Irene only he could see.

"I'd go get us some rum but you are definitely in no condition to be left alone."

"You were gonna leave earlier," Todd replied feebly.

Blair sighed and pulled up a rocking chair. "Even if I'd gone through with leaving, I wouldn't have gone very far."

Todd made a noise that Blair assumed was his weak attempt at a laugh in his condition. "I'm in trouble, Blair."

"When aren't you?" Blair sighed, propping her feet up on the coffee table. She was in for a long night. She was glad she'd been able to find some extra clothes upstairs for her and Todd. Both of theirs were bloody messes. And there were plenty of blankets in order to see the chillier mountain nights through. Blair didn't expect anything too worrisome, temperature wise, unless it pertained to Todd.

She was _very_ worried about him.

"I'm serious."

"I know," she reached over and patted his leg through the blanket she had tucked around him. "I know. We'll get through it. We'll figure it out."

He focused on her, his gaze intense. "You're really on my side," he said wonderingly.

Her brow furrowed. "Of course I am, you idiot," she snapped. She was getting tired of this crap. How much shit did she have to swallow? How many times did she have to roll over and forgive for Todd to get it? She had just saved his life and dug a bullet out of his body, for God's sake. "If you haven't figured it out by now..."

"Easy there..." Todd murmured. "Didn't mean to make you mad."

"As if you have to try."

"True," that feeble laugh sound came out of him again. "My girl's always been sharp angles and over-sensitive. A lot like me. Probably why we're so perfect together."

Blair blinked back tears and watched as Todd drifted off again. She wished she knew if he even meant what he said... or if he was aware of what he said... because every moment in his presence reminded her of where her heart truly lay. There was no cycle to break. She would always and only truly love Todd Manning.

* * *

"Can we go over it again, Louie?" John asked. He knew he was pushing it but he wanted to make absolutely certain that Louie's story was accurate. He'd hidden the homeless man away in a safe house. Louie was probably happy to have a roof over his head, a warm bed and some regular meals but even with all of that, John could tell he was getting tired of this repetition.

"He gave me the gun," Louie said slowly, as if he were talking to a child. "I told him about your guns for cash program and asked if he'd give me the gun so he did. He talked a little about the things he was going through and then he wished me a good evening, reminded me to take the gun straight to you, and headed off.

"Except I didn't get very far. I heard another voice when I turned the corner so I went around the alley to come out the other side and see what was going on."

"And what did you see?"

"Red-haired lady, older," Louie laughed. "Maybe about as older as me, you know what I'm saying?"

John smiled. He always did like Louie.

"She was saying something about how his brother was dead and the only question that remained was if he was going to die, too, or go down for killing the brother." Louie scratched his head. "Manning asked her what she wanted from him... why she kept doing this... and she said that he wouldn't give her what he wanted. Manning got real hot about that. Practically _screamed_ at her that she kept him locked up and tortured him for eight years for some phantom item that he didn't even know about." Louie paused.

"Go ahead, Louie, what then?"

"I was just thinking," Louie said quietly. "It just reminded me of some of the boys that came back from the war... much later. The POWs that got shut up some place... tortured... beaten... starved... It doesn't sit right with me that was done to our own. On our own soil. That ain't right."

"No," John agreed quietly. "It's not." There was a lot to deal with in regards to this whole situation. For one thing, the guy he had always thought was Manning wasn't that man. The replacement didn't seem to be much better than the original as far as deeds done but even with all of that John had major issues with what had been done to Todd. He had been Bureau once and the thought of CIA taking matters into their own hands in regards to US citizens on US soil and locking them away didn't sit well with him either. "Go on, Louie, the clearer I am on what went down that night the better."

"They went back and forth on that for a while. She didn't believe he didn't know what she was talking about. He couldn't believe she didn't believe him... finally said something about how if he had known what she wanted he would have told her ages ago so he'd either have been let go to come home to his family or put out of his misery. She finally laughed and said she wanted the chip."

"The chip," John nodded. Louie had mentioned this in every retelling of what he had witnessed. The question was... _what chip_?

"Yeah, that's right. Manning didn't seem to know what she was talking about. After a few minutes of that, him denying, her not believing, she finally said that if he didn't know how to get what she wanted then he was no use to her. That's when she shot him."

Louie sighed heavily. "She didn't kill him, though. He was on the ground, clutching his shoulder and she walked over to him real slow like. I was getting ready to shoot her myself... I was thinking I had to do something. But he kicked her legs out from under her and they both went for the gun. I'm thinking he could have disarmed her easy but with that wound, and it was bleeding pretty bad, he was definitely not at his best. Hell, I wouldn't even say he was at his best before he got shot... man looks like he's been through a wringer for a long time.

"Anyway, they struggled and the gun went off. She went down and he looked... surprised... not quite there... stunned." Louie frowned in remembrance. "He backed into one of the crates and it snapped him out of... whatever he was in. I've seen that look before, McBain. That look he had... I've seen it in boys on the other side of the world. That Manning needs help. Bad."

John nodded. "Keep going, Louie."

"He looked around like he wasn't sure what happened... saw the woman on the ground, moved towards her like he was ready to run if she twitched... then checked her pulse and realized she was dead. That's when he realized he was holding the gun. He dropped it like was on fire and then took off."

"What about the gun he gave you, Louie?" John prompted. "What happened to it?"

"Well, I was catching my own breath when I heard someone running and that's when she showed up."

"Describe her, please."

"Tall woman. Skinny. Very pretty. She was calling for Todd. She saw the woman and just about lost it. She started screaming Manning's name. I... I was afraid she was going to call some bad attention to herself making all that noise so I stepped out. She sure wasn't happy to see me at first, looked wary and asked me if I killed the woman. I said no and she pointed to the gun I had... I held it out to her, holding it by the barrel and she recognized it. She demanded I give her gun back to her. I said I was turning it in for cash. She wanted to know who gave it to me. I wasn't too keen on giving up anything but she gave me this look and said that her ex-husband stole that gun from her house and if I didn't give it back to her I'd be sorry."

John smiled lightly. It sounded like Blair to him. "So what did you do?"

"I said I didn't want any trouble and gave her the gun. Then she gave me $200 and asked if I knew what happened. I wasn't sure where to start but she asked if I'd seen Todd and I told her that he ran off and pointed the way. She went after him immediately."

"She didn't ask about the dead woman after that?"

"She seemed far more interested in Manning's whereabouts but she did tell me to call the cops as she left. Which I did. And that's when I called you."

John nodded. "Okay Louie. Thanks for going through it again. I'd like you to hang out here for a little longer if that's all right."

Louie shrugged. "That's fine. That's fine. For now... can't stay gone too long or things pass by."

"Yeah," John nodded again. "I guess they do."

* * *

"Bless your beautiful hide," Blair sang to herself as she rinsed out a washcloth in the sink. "Wherever you may be. I don't know your name but I'm a-stakin' my claim, you're the gal for meeee."

"What the hell are you singing?" Todd asked, his voice irritated and still weary.

"Oh, sorry," Blair came over to check on him. His fever was still up. Luckily, Tea would be there soon with the antibiotics that Dorian had prescribed. "That movie was on the other night and the songs are in my head."

"What movie is that?"

"_Seven Brides for Seven Brothers_."

"Sounds like a recipe for disaster."

"Oh, you'd like it. It's about a bunch of boorish, asshole men and the women who love them anyway."

"Tell you what," Todd let his head fall back on the cushions Blair fluffed for him. "If I make it through this we'll watch it together."

"Well, you're going to make it through this," Blair assured him. "And if that's the deal you're making, I want you to watch it without snorting constantly the way you do through any movie that doesn't involve ridiculous amounts of blood or fart jokes."

That faint smile touched his lips again. "Deal."

* * *

John watched Victor for several moments. He couldn't imagine that the man was going to be remotely helpful. There was some mysterious chip somewhere that was worth killing and dying over and if Manning himself didn't know where it was then there was the definite possibility that Victor might. He had infiltrated Manning's entire life, after all.

The problem was that Manning's return effectively changed Victor's life and it wasn't necessarily for the better. Victor was living off of Manning's money and had already dug his feet in about holding onto everything. So John couldn't imagine that Victor was going to be forthcoming about anything he knew that might jeopardize the life he'd created.

Tea did not seem to John to be a very good option. She might be interested in finding a solution to their situation but, at the same time, she was protective of her husband and a defense lawyer. She wasn't likely to participate in anything that would go against his interests.

John was frustrated by Blair and Todd's disappearance but Blair was not likely to abandon her children and Starr had already informed him that she had spoken to her mother. The young woman stubbornly refused to reveal anything else. John was getting really sick of the whole family. Apparently, Blair's behavior while they were involved was the exception rather than the rule and even then she got secretive, stubborn and manipulative at times.

It left John with precious little to work with and the only option he could see was Tomas Delgado. Tomas had no love of Victor so he wasn't likely to protect him. However, his interest in Blair might prove to be an issue. Still, it was a better choice than the others. Given Tomas' own history with the CIA it was likely he'd have some insight and he had certainly been eager to go against his former employers in dragging Irene out into the light. Still, the CIA and the FBI were natural adversaries. John may not be considered a current agent and Tomas' status wasn't exactly clear but they did come from two opposing forces.

Yet, it wasn't a rift that was unable to be bridged. John moved towards Tomas who was sitting at the dining room table and nodded at him.

Tomas got John's wordless request immediately and stood up. They retreated to the back yard by the pool and Tomas waited for John to start.

"There's some item of importance that Manning apparently had in his possession that Irene wanted. Do you know anything about it?"

"An item?" Tomas shrugged. "My involvement in Todd's handling was based on falsified information that he was funding terrorists. Are we talking about records of that nature or something else?"

John shook his head. "A chip."

"A chip," Tomas frowned. "Is that all?"

"It's what I have right now. A chip. A chip that Irene was so desperate to get a hold of that she falsified records to unlawfully imprison Manning. I'm not even going to go down the number of laws that were broken in that act alone."

Tomas rolled his eyes. "Save your convenient morality for someone else, McBain. I'm not going to apologize to you for the things I've done."

"Have you apologized to Blair?"

"That's between me and Blair."

"And where _is_ Blair?" John asked. "Has she contacted you since yesterday?"

"Weren't you asking me about a chip?"

Which meant 'no.' John had a feeling that whatever progress Tomas had made with Blair had come screeching to a halt upon Manning revealing himself at the premiere. And laying a scorching kiss on Blair while doing so. John almost felt sorry for the guy until he recalled the sorry state of his own love life and then did legitimately feel for him. "Any ideas?"

"On what's on it? I can speculate that it's information. Information worth killing over. It's likely a microchip of some kind. It could look like just about anything but it would probably be fairly small. If Manning had it then Victor would have had access to it but since Irene was still torturing Todd over it then clearly Victor didn't know how to get it."

"Or he didn't know that Irene was looking for it," John replied. "Victor may be a bit of a loose cannon but it seems he disappeared so completely into the role he played that he wasn't any real use to Irene, either."

"He's still unstable which is what makes him so dangerous... at least it did to Irene. What's left of her organization is questionable but I would imagine that finding that chip would be the best way to dismantle it completely."

"Well, you live here," John pointed out. "Maybe you can keep your eyes open."

Tomas' expression didn't change but there was a glimmer of interest in his eyes. "What are you suggesting, McBain?"

"Don't be coy, Delgado. I've told you what Irene's been looking for. What you do with that is up to you."

"With the unspoken expectation that I'll bring anything I find to you," Tomas confirmed.

"I guess we understand each other."


	3. Chapter 3

Tea Delgado felt awkward, silly and unnecessary.

She had walked into the cabin to find Todd and Blair just a breath away from a kiss. Now, Blair was bustling about the room, making sure that Todd had taken his first dose of medication, and trying to act casual. For Blair, that meant the exact opposite. She was flustered, flushed and frenetic.

Todd, meanwhile, watched Blair with a slight smile the whole time.

Tea felt more than a little foolish. It was like the days when she and Todd were together and yet Blair was always a part of his life, usually by his own insistence, and she felt like the third wheel in her own marriage. She wondered how she could have possibly thought that Victor was Todd. Well, Victor fooled everyone else, too. Maybe she didn't feel as bad as all that.

She had filled Blair and Todd in on the events at her house. Tomas killing Baker who had come to kill Victor was a huge deal and Todd actually smiled at that.

Blair frowned.

Tea felt she should be more indignant about what she had walked in on for her brother's sake but it was hard to be that upset. It was Blair. It was Todd. The real Todd. She sighed inwardly. Not so very long ago she had felt such triumph and vindication at the fact that Todd had chosen her.

But he wasn't Todd.

And sitting here now with a bandaged Todd on the sofa looking sweaty and clammy and stubbly and still keeping his hawkish eyes on Blair no matter where she went she realized what a wretched mess their relationship had been. He'd been fairly clear on it since his return. He'd even apologized for the way he treated her when they were together. As his eyes followed Blair, Tea could see the longing in his eyes; the longing for Blair that had always been there for as long as she had known him.

She had tried to warn Tomas after the movie premiere. He had boldly claimed that Blair wanted to move forward with him but Tea suspected Blair had made that statement before she knew that her Todd was really back.

Her Todd. It still stung but it was strange how it didn't hurt as much as she expected._ I really love Victor._ Now she had to figure out her life and her love without Todd being the center of it. Victor wasn't the only one who had a whole new unexplored frontier ahead of him. She pushed it all aside and focused on things she did understand, like the law.

"As you can imagine, the police are looking for you," Tea said to Todd.

"They must not be looking very hard," Todd replied, reluctantly tearing his eyes away from the object of his affection. "It's not like this is some secret cabin owned by my secret sister."

He never did take things regarding the law very seriously. "There's a lot to clean up in town before a full on search is implemented," Tea stood up seeing no real reason to stay. "And I guess they aren't too worried about you skipping town after you just got back. If you're even remotely interested in taking my legal advice, turn yourself in. The mitigating circumstances surrounding Irene's death can only work in your favor."

"Did you forget who you were talking to?"

"Not for a second," Tea looked at Blair. "Try to talk some sense into him. He might actually listen to you."

Blair's expression was skeptical before she asked. "How are the kids?"

"They're fine. No moves were made on them last night. It seemed that Victor was the only target." An involuntary shudder ran down Tea's spine as she was reminded of how close she'd come to losing him. She'd already come so close too many times. "Starr's got things taken care of at home," Tea grinned. "She takes after her parents."

"How's Jack?"

"He takes after his parents too... just in a different way."

"Sam? Hope?"

"His brother and sister are looking out for him. And Hope is just fine. I'm sure she barely even knows what's going on."

Blair walked Tea out and came back in to sit down.

"Have I told you yet how bizarre it is that you two get along?"

"I suppose it is."

"How'd that even happen?"

"I'm a fucking saint is how it happened," Blair leaned her head against the back of the rocking chair and closed her eyes. "I don't want to get into it."

"Why?"

"Because it opens up a lot of things that I do _not_ want to talk about."

"Blair," Todd watched her for a moment. "What happened while I was gone?"

"Get some rest, Todd," Blair sighed. "You need it."

Todd stared silently at her, trying to get her to open her eyes and look at him. He wanted to see her expression and know what she was thinking the way he used to. She kept her eyes closed and he laid his head back onto the cushions. There would be time enough for explanations later. He closed his eyes and let sleep claim him again.

Time enough soon.

* * *

Soon was a word that Todd would have to revisit. A week had passed and he hadn't been able to really sit down and talk to Blair about anything. The most he'd gotten was an impassioned plea from her in court to step up and own what he did to Irene.

He had argued that if he confessed to killing her he would lose everything he fought to come home to.

She had grabbed a hold of his hand and promised him he wouldn't.

Todd had been exonerated due to mitigating circumstances. Delgado had done her job well. Nora had looked sick with each passing moment. Even after all this time, Nora wanted nothing more than to imprison him for life. So much for eight years of torture meaning anything to certain people in town. Todd should have known better than to think he might catch a break.

He was sitting at Viki's kitchen table with a lawyer that Blair had hired for him. The lawyer, one Cybil Claremont by name, was actually very sharp, going over Todd's identity case with a fine tooth comb and drilling him on everything he knew about from his time in Irene's care to when he got out. "Your records are a mess," she remarked. "There are holes that clearly weren't there before you disappeared."

Todd felt depressed. His life had been stolen from him and there were nothing but obstacles in his way.

"Mr. Manning, this is going to be a fight," Cybil told him. "But it's a fight I am fully committed to winning. Because of your absence I'm going to have to discuss certain aspects of your missing years with those who were actually _here_. I believe I'll be able to put together a plan of attack from there."

"Okay," Todd heaved a sigh as Viki came into the room. "Just keep me updated."

"Will do," Cybil stood up. "I'm also filing a motion to freeze the accounts so that Mr. Lord can't start moving funds anywhere," she turned her attention to Viki. "Ms. Lord, may I make an appointment with you in regards to the eight years that Mr. Manning was missing and replaced by his brother?"

"Certainly," Viki nodded. "Whatever I can do to help."

The two women consulted their schedules and were able to agree on the next morning. With that, Cybil excused herself, gathered her things and left the house.

Todd scrubbed at his eyes with his fingers. He needed to talk to Blair. He needed to see her and hear her voice and know that she was on his side. He looked up as Viki sat down across from him in Cybil's vacated seat. "Hey."

"Well, how is it going with the lawyer?"

"It's going to be a fight," Todd sighed. "She's gathering intel."

Viki nodded. "So it would seem." She paused. "Is there any way that you might be talked into a reasonable resolution to this?"

"What's reasonable?" Todd asked suspiciously.

The clip clop of Tina's shoes announced her arrival and her unwanted opinion on matters. "Dividing things equally of course!"

Todd sent a vile look towards his sister. "None of it was left to you in the first place and you are entitled to nothing!"

"I'm just as much Victor Lord's daughter as you are," Tina insisted huffily. "Why shouldn't his money be mine?"

"Take it up with your mother, then," Todd hissed.

"Well, I can't very well do that," Tina rolled her eyes. "You fixed that, didn't you?"

"Yeah, I fixed that," Todd snarled. "I fixed that after that bitch held me captive, tortured me for eight years, replaced me in my own life and tried to kill me. What the hell are you so upset about anyway? She pawned you off and pretended to die to get rid of you!"

Tina shrugged but a flash of hurt reflected in her eyes. "You think I don't know that?"

"Face it," Todd stood up and went over to the refrigerator, yanking it open to browse inside for something to eat. "Our parents were monsters."

"All the more reason for us to band together!" Tina insisted. "To come together and share equally in the pain and the misfortune..."

"And the fortune?" Todd snapped. "That's what it all comes down to with you, doesn't it? Like you ever gave a damn about me. You only cared about my money!"

"Well, I guess I have something in common with that whore you're so in love with," Tina shot back.

Viki winced as Todd slammed the refrigerator door shut. This was veering well out of control.

"Blair Cramer cares about a hell of a lot more than just my money," he growled. "And she's a thousand times the woman you are, too. Cord got that... and that's what really galls you, doesn't it? You hate that Cord was in love with her and she got her mits on my money when you couldn't scrape enough together to bleach your hair." He gave Tina a once over. "By the way, the red hair looks better on you anyway."

"Oh," Tina preened. "Thank you." Her demeanor shifted immediately. "And Cord doesn't love that woman!"

"Not since I got her right from under his nose," Todd boasted. "But don't think for a second he doesn't still care. And Blair doesn't give a crap about money these days," Todd wasn't exactly sure of that but even when he was lurking around town she didn't seem at all concerned with money. And she was hanging out with Tomas Delgado who was not exactly rolling in it. "Bet you anything Cord would find that a welcome relief. If you're not careful, Sis, he might get a gander at her and wonder if there's any sparks left."

Tina turned bright red. "You might worry about that yourself!" She turned on her heel and stomped out of the kitchen.

"Can you believe her?" Todd asked Viki.

Viki wondered what she was thinking harboring dreams of all her siblings being together again. Five minutes with Todd and Tina's bickering and she was ready to move to Bali and get away from it all. They were as bad as Natalie and Jessica at their worst. "I think you were both behaving like children."

"Oh, whatever," Todd scoffed. "All she did was confirm what I wanted anyway. My entire life was taken from me and I am getting all of it back. All of it. My newspaper. My kids. And especially Blair!"

Viki blinked. "Blair?"

Todd seemed taken aback at her surprise. "Yes, Blair! What did you think?"

"Well," Viki hedged. "Tea's been the prime focus..."

"For Victor," Todd interrupted pointedly. "Hell, that should have tipped people off."

"You and Blair were divorced when you disappeared."

"That was probably a bad idea."

"You two hurt each other a lot."

"Well, what couple doesn't have their ups and downs?"

"There's a lot of bad history."

Todd gave his sister a calculating look. "Are you trying to talk me out of being with Blair?"

"I'm just pointing out facts," Viki said.

"All the bad facts," Todd raised an eyebrow at her. "You must want me to go fight Victor for Tea's hand or something."

"I didn't say that," Viki hedged.

"You didn't have to," Todd shook his head. "Tea's not the one that kept me alive. Tea's not the one I fought to get back to. All that is Blair. _Blair_." He sighed. "I thought about her every day when we were apart. It's a difficult thing to miss a woman. And I was so afraid that I had been forgotten but when I came back and I kissed her at the premiere... she remembered, I _know_ she did." He glanced up at Viki. Her expression was warm as she listened to him. "When we were up in the cabin... she saved my life. She did. If it hadn't been for Blair I would have bled all over your kitschy over-stuffed couch."

Viki rolled her eyes in amusement.

"And when we were together..." Todd got a faraway look in his eye. "There's something between us. There is. We _both_ felt it."

"I thought she was involved with Tomas Delgado," Viki pointed out.

Todd's dismissive expression made it clear what he thought of that. "Well... things change."

* * *

If Victor had resented Blair's family when they were together, it was nothing compared to the resentment he felt for Tea's brother. Tomas Delgado was a thorn in his side and had been from the moment he set foot in Llanview.

Truth be told, Victor harbored a great deal of resentment towards Blair for being the reason Tomas showed up in town at all. If she hadn't gone looking for answers about that stupid painting then he would still be Todd Manning. As far as he was concerned, Blair ruined everything by being the nosy little bitch she always was.

Why had he ever thought he loved her?

He didn't, he reminded himself. That was _Todd_ who loved her. Not him. Oh, sure, she was hot and good for a roll in the hay every now and then but when it came down to it, once Todd's persona began to fade away he was left wanting more. Blair didn't like it rough the way Tea did. Tea loved fighting and it turned him on, too. To Blair, fighting was fighting. It wasn't foreplay the way it was for him and Tea. Blair wasn't accommodating enough. She didn't roll over when he wanted her to, she didn't excuse him when he did the wrong thing, and she wasn't crazy about angry, rough sex.

And when had she become such an icy bitch anyway? Blair just looked through him anymore and if she wasn't doing that then there was a significant amount of animosity in her eyes. She didn't much give a damn about him. Her concern was Todd. Her precious Todd.

Not him.

It rankled him, he had to admit it. As long as he was Todd, Blair would always give him significance but now?

He glanced over at Tomas who was sketching on the couch. "Have you talked to Blair lately?"

Tomas only paused briefly in his work. "No, she's been avoiding me."

Victor found that somewhat gratifying. Tomas annoyed him, particularly because he had saved his life twice now, so he didn't want Tomas to be happy. It was just a shame that Dani and Tea didn't agree with that. "So what are you going to do about it?"

"Give her some time."

Victor snorted. "Yeah, good idea, if you want to lose her completely."

Tomas stopped what he was doing and leveled a look at Victor. "And you care why?"

"I don't," Victor shrugged. He didn't like it when Tomas looked at him like that. It was the expression Victor had taken to calling The Sniper Look because it made him think of Tomas' ability to take someone out with a high-powered rifle at long range. Sure, it saved his life but Victor had the distinct feeling that Tomas would point that rifle at him if he thought he could get away with it.

It was Tomas' turn to snort. "Whatever you say," he went back to his work.

"You think Todd's just waiting around and giving her time?"

"She was done with Todd," Tomas pointed out.

"She was done with _me_," Victor corrected. "When you outed me and Todd showed up that wiped everything out. And she may have been done with Todd when you spirited him off to Irene's twisted version of Neverland but I was able to win her back as Todd. The real thing can do it, too."

"Yeah, you really sound like a guy who doesn't care."

"Hey, maybe I'm just thinking that if you're with Blair then you're out of my hair for awhile."

"It's always about you, isn't it?" Tomas' mouth turned up into a sardonic grin. "Nice to know that hasn't changed since the big reveal." He shook his head slightly and kept drawing. He enjoyed the fact that Victor didn't like it and he intended to keep right on doing it. The more agitated he got, the more likely he'd slip up or storm out and either one was right for Tomas' interest in digging around.

He still had a microchip to find.


	4. Chapter 4

Blair had a splitting headache.

Jack was still chafing under his restrictions after his role in bullying Shane came out. The unfortunate attempt to gaslight the other boy into an abandoned house for the night hadn't exactly made things easier. Jack resented everyone and everything and, currently, was taking it all out on her.

Blair recognized that her son was scared. She knew the way her kids lashed out and she took what Jack piled onto her and did her best to remain calm. His words were hurtful, though, and combined with everything else that was going on the tension was too much to deal with. She felt like one gigantic knot and her head throbbed painfully.

When the doorbell rang she considered ignoring it. She slowly got to her feet anyway. It did no good to try to ignore the world, it always came calling one way or the other.

Todd was at the door looking hopeful.

"Hey," she said wearily.

He took her in for a moment. "Headache?"

She wanted to cry. He knew her so well and it continued to astonish her that she could think Victor was Todd for so long. She nodded and lumbered back into the living room to ease herself onto the sofa again.

Todd followed her and watched the grimace on her face. "Bad one, huh?"

"Yes," she whispered. "I want so badly to cry right now but I know that will just make it worse."

"Hold on," Todd told her and turned on his heel to bound up the stairs. Once he got there he bellowed Jack's name as he roamed the halls. Once... twice... the third time, Jack poked his head out of his door.

He glared at Todd angrily. "What the hell do _you_ want?"

"Your mother's got a headache."

"Yeah? Is yelling your brilliant solution then?"

He was definitely a smart-ass just like his old man. Todd almost preened but stuck to the matter at hand. "Look, I know you play soccer so you must have some Ben-Gay."

"So what if I do?"

"Let me have it."

Jack stared at him.

"It's for your mother," Todd explained.

"Hey, I don't want to know about whatever kinky crap you two get up to. And leave my Mom alone anyway!"

"It's for her headache!"

Jack's scowl increased. "Fine." He went into his bathroom and came back out, tossing the tube at Todd who deftly caught it with one hand.

"Good," Todd reached in and grabbed Jack by the shirt. "Now come on."

"What the hell?"

Todd dragged his son downstairs and nudged him towards the kitchen. "Go make your Mom some tea."

"Yeah right!" Jack hissed. "Why?"

"Because it's for your Mom," Todd shot back. "You got a glimpse of Irene. Do you even realize how good you've got it in the Mom department? She's hurting right now so do something nice for her and make her some damn tea!"

Jack stomped into the kitchen and began loudly clattering around as he worked on boiling the noisiest kettle of water in history.

Todd went into the living room again to find Blair giving him a suspicious look through one bleary eye. "What?"

"What are you up to?"

"Helping you out," Todd replied, rubbing some Ben-Gay into his hands and motioning her to sit up. When she did so, he let his hands knead the base of her skull and then rubbed the lotion into her temples before putting more on and just gently working it into her neck. The smell was strong but it was a headache remedy Todd had come up with years ago that actually seemed to work. He never knew if it was the lotion's ability to relax muscles or the scent but it did make really bad headaches go away.

Blair sighed softly. It was a strange remedy but it had always worked. How strange that she had forgotten it over the years. Todd quietly massaging the base of her skill was something she hadn't missed until just that moment. He worked on her for a few minutes and she felt herself relaxing. The headache was still there but the pain wasn't so debilitating. She felt like she could relax and get some sleep until it went away.

Jack came in with a tray. The teapot, a cup and some honey were situated on it and Todd nodded for him to put it on the end table. He eased himself off the couch and fluffed some pillows for Blair to lay down on as Jack poured a cup of tea.

A slight smile touched Blair's face as she watched Todd and Jack quietly go about their work. Her smile widened as Jack handed her the tea and she whispered a thank you to him. Todd shooed Jack out of the room and closed the doors behind him, winking at Blair as he did so.

She settled back and let her eyes shut as she drifted off into a much needed nap.

"So who takes care of your mom?" Todd asked when he and Jack went back into the kitchen.

"Mom takes care of everyone," Jack shrugged.

"And what about this house full of women? Where's the Cramer Coven at?"

Jack found himself mildly enjoying Todd's irreverent way of referencing the distaff side of his family. He wondered if he should put a stop to the conversation but Todd pulled out two sodas from the fridge and slid one to him across the counter. "Dorian's a senator now."

Todd nodded. "That's right. Is it really true she's married to David Vickers?"

"Yeah," Jack replied. "He's filming a movie in Sweden, I think."

"When I disappeared, they hated each other."

"I was still little when they got together," Jack shrugged. "But one of my first real memories is Mom slugging Vickers right in the jaw."

"Really?" Todd grinned. "That's my girl. Bet she's still got a hell of a hook too." He took a drink of his soda. "You know, I taught her that."

"She ever slug you?"

Todd nodded. "She sure did."

Jack watched as Todd's eyes softened at the memory. Then he caught Jack watching him and ducked his head.

"What about the rest of the Cramers? Is Cassie still in Savannah?"

"Yeah. River's in Julliard. Kelly just went back to London with Joey."

"Oh, it's back to Joey?" Todd snickered. "How soon before she jumps on Kevin again?"

"That's not even the half of it," Jack snorted. "She's got a kid, Zane, and he-"

"She named her kid Zane?!" Todd shook his head. "Oh... hell, she named him after that Western writer guy, didn't she? Which Buchanan did she have the kid with?"

"Duke."

Jack forgot all of his animosity at Todd's arrival shaking up his life when the horrified expression of realization settled on Todd's face. It was so rare he got to be the one to deliver shocking and surprising news and he reveled in the moment.

"Are you _kidding_ me?!" Todd demanded.

Jack shook his head.

"Kelly had a baby with _Kevin's_ _kid_? The one she helped _raise_?!" Todd shuddered. "Let me tell you, Jack, that girl has always been the freakiest one. And not in a good way."

"Is it true she killed Mom's baby?"

Todd sobered at that. He stared down at the can of soda in his hand, remembering that night when Blair came so close to dying, and how he had foolishly thrown her away because he feared Dorian. That night... he would hate Kelly forever for that night. "Yes."

Jack took in Todd's stony countenance. "Mom doesn't talk about it, either."

"Your Mom doesn't like talking about things that hurt her," Todd nodded. "She doesn't like it when people think she's weak."

"Why did you give me away?" Jack blurted out. He hadn't meant to. But the way the discussion turned it came burbling up into his mind and he couldn't help himself. If this was the real Todd Manning then he would have a real answer.

"Because I was stupid and selfish and cruel," he responded without hesitation. His hazel eyes met Jack's unwaveringly. "It was the worst thing I've ever done to your mother and there is a litany of things I've done... to her.. to others that are pretty awful. That was the worst thing I've ever done to her and I regretted it the second it I did it."

"Why didn't you fix it then?!" Jack demanded. "Everything could have been better!"

Todd shook his head. "I was raised by a man who was not my biological father and he turned me into a monster. I was so afraid that I would do that to you... and Max," he paused. "Have you ever met Max?"

Jack shook his head. "I was still little when he left town."

"Lucky you," Todd grumbled. "Max was a jerk. He was your mother's first love and, because of that, she always had a soft spot for him and let him get away with treating her like shit."

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Mom wouldn't want you talking like that."

"I'm sure you've heard worse."

The boy shrugged. "Mom still wouldn't like it."

"Your mother can swear like a sailor."

Jack grinned and Todd realized for the first time that his son had the same smile he did. He was struck speechless for a moment.

"Anyway, Max was a jerk and loved nothing more than to make your Mom miserable and me miserable. By that time, he wasn't exactly living in the pink and he got his jollies by trying to come between your mother and me. I don't think he cared much that Blair was allegedly pregnant with his kid... he was just happy that he could twist the knife in me." Todd sighed. "Every time I was about to tell your Mom that I could try to be your father, Max would show up and start crowing about '_My_ child! _My_ baby! I have a connection with Blair now, Manning, and you can't do _anything_ about it!'" Todd thumped the counter with his fist.

"Sounds like a real jerk," Jack agreed.

"Yeah. He was," Todd looked his son in the eyes. "But that still doesn't excuse what I did."

Jack lifted his chin, seeming to remember he was supposed to hate his father. "That's right. It doesn't." The walls went up again and Todd was suddenly struck by how much his son resembled Blair. "So, Mom's having a nap. No reason for you to stick around, is there Scarface?" He turned on his heel and stalked out of the kitchen, stomping up the stairs.

Todd's eyes followed the sound of his son's angry footsteps through the ceiling until he heard a distant door slam. For some reason he felt hopeful. He'd had an actual conversation with his son and had seen the real Jack that was buried underneath the angry teenage bravado. Jack was confused and frustrated and uncertain what his path was. And Todd knew that he was really the only one who would be able to provide the answers.

Victor may know about Todd's life but he didn't live any of it and for all that Irene was able to transpose Todd's memories she wasn't able to get them all.

That was the key.

To everything.


	5. Chapter 5

Blair awoke slowly, her head fuzzy with that grogginess that comes from a deep sleep. She blinked and rubbed her face, her limbs felt heavy and she opened her mouth in a terrific yawn as she got her bearings.

"You still sleep like the dead," Todd's voice murmured from across the room.

She turned her head to see him sprawled casually in one of the chairs. His long legs were stretched out onto the ottoman and crossed at the ankle and he was reading a book. He glanced at her as she rolled onto her side and let her feet fall to the ground before sitting up.

"Good nap?"

She yawned again as she nodded. "What time is it?"

"Six."

"Oh crap," Blair leaned her elbows on her knees and shook her head slightly, trying to get rid of the cobwebs. "I need to get the kids dinner..."

"I ordered pizza," Todd told her. "They're all in the kitchen scarfing away and being noisy."

Blair cocked her head. She did hear the muted sounds of her brood enjoying their meal in the other room. "Pizza's usually a Friday night thing."

Todd shrugged. "You needed the rest. You were sacked out. You didn't even move. Except once when your leg twitched for like three minutes. Whose ass were you trying to kick?"

She smirked. "Yours maybe?"

"Not likely," Todd grinned. "I have done anything to deserve an ass-kicking lately."

"All in due time."

"Ye of little faith," Todd scoffed.

"I have enormous faith in you, Todd," Blair replied smoothly. "And your ability to piss me off."

"Well, that I am good at," he agreed. "But I'm pretty good at being good to you, too. Your headache's gone, isn't it?"

She nodded. "Thank you."

"Hasn't anyone been taking care of you, Blair?"

Blair stared at him, wide-eyed. "Wha-aat?"

"No, huh," Todd continued, non-plussed. "I asked Jack and he said that you took care of everyone else. I have to say that didn't surprise me. You used to take care of me when I was down and out and had nothing... actually, that's kind of where I'm at right now, come to think of it. But I got to take care of you today which is really what I want to do."

"I must still be asleep," Blair muttered, pinching her arm. She winced then looked back at Todd. "What's this all about?"

"I'm declaring my intentions," Todd said proudly.

"Your intentions," Blair pinched herself again.

"I am officially announcing to you that I am courting you."

Blair just stared.

"Good," Todd nodded. "You don't object. Courtship is a go." He tossed his book onto the table and got to his feet. "I think we should have a drink at Rodi's."

"Rodi's."

"To celebrate."

"Celebrate," Blair repeated. She glanced down at her arm which had three more pinch marks she had put there. "God, I look like a junkie now."

"A junkie for me?"

She snorted appreciatively at that. "Well, it wouldn't be too far off." She stood up and looked at him wonderingly.

"So, we on for drinks?"

Blair reached forward and pinched him on the neck.

"Ow!" He slapped her hand away. "What the hell was _that_ for?"

"Maybe this is _your_ dream."

"We are both awake," he snapped. "God, why was I cursed with a woman like you?"

"You have to ask?"

The smile he gave her took her breath away. "You're both reward and penance. I don't have any cash on me. You're going to have to pay for drinks."

"Some courtship this is," Blair tossed her head. "You're only after my money, aren't you?"

"Yeah, I like hot, blond, rich grandmothers."

"Playing the older woman card?" Blair crossed her arms over her chest. "Shall I start calling you David Vickers now?"

He winced. "You really know how to hurt a guy."

"Remember that." The corners of her mouth turned up in response to the banter. "I have to go to Capricorn tonight so if you want to have drinks with me we can go there and mooch off the owner."

"RJ?" Todd nodded. "I'm sure he'll be thrilled to see me."

"Nope, RJ left a few years ago."

"Who are we mooching off of then?"

Blair grinned and wrinkled her nose at him. "Me. Pick me up in an hour."

* * *

"Seriously, Dad, what's going on?" Starr gave her father a stern look.

He couldn't help but beam at her. She had his eyes but the expression was all Blair. His little Shorty was something else, all right. "What?"

"You've been parked here all day, you ordered pizza, Mom was taking a nap, and then you left for like a half hour and now you're back in a nicer shirt. What's going on?"

"Your Mom and I are going to Capricorn."

"On a date?" Starr looked skeptical. "Does Mom know this?"

"I suggested Rodi's," Todd admitted. "But apparently your Mom owns Capricorn now? How'd that happen?"

"Antonio needed to sell it and Cris asked Mom if she was interested and she was," Starr eyed her father, who looked very handsome in hunter green. "You know she sings there."

He perked up at that. "She does? Every night?"

"No," Starr hid a smirk. She'd always had the idea that her Dad was fond of her Mom singing and his keen interest proved her right. "You can get a schedule at the club to see when she does sing. She owns the place so she does like to go there regularly and be charming, which she is."

"Your Mom can be _too_ charming sometimes."

Starr rolled her eyes. "Dad, can you at least _try_ to control your stupid jealousy?"

Todd wasn't about to agree to that just yet. "So maybe you can tell me about your Mom and Tomas."

"What do you want to know?"

"How serious are they?"

Starr considered that. "Mom likes him. I'm pretty sure they haven't slept together." Starr decided to keep it to herself that they had fully intended to and leave that for her mother to explain. "Mom has been hurt so badly by too many guys and she really has been trying to take things slow and figure it all out," she shook her head. "But she hasn't really talked to him much since the premiere."

"That's good," Todd piped up. He caught Starr's stormy expression. "Right? It isn't? Why isn't it good?"

"I didn't say it wasn't good," she explained slowly. "I just think that despite all of her attempts to be careful she wound up with another guy who lied to her and, frankly, lying about you wasn't even the first time for him. I'm just sick of guys walking all over her." She jabbed a finger at him. "And I don't want to see you doing it again, either!"

Todd held his hands up in a placating gesture. "It's the last thing I want to do, Starr."

She fixed him with another Blairian glare. "Behave yourself."

He grinned. "Don't know if want to do _that_."

"_DAD_!"

"Oh, it's just like old times," Blair cooed as she swept into the room, looking radiant in a dark purple cheongsam dress with a gold dragon curling around her body.

"Wow," Todd took in the sight. The dress hugged every curve yet the cut was modest. The skirt was knee length and there wasn't even a hint of cleavage but Blair somehow managed to be devastatingly sexy.

"Thank you," she beamed at him and then checked her watch. "Okay, I'm probably not going to be back before eleven."

"Don't worry, Mom," Starr hugged her mother. "I've got it covered. You go take care of business."

"Take care of business?" Todd asked as they went out to the car.

"Capricorn's been neglected since you strolled back into town," Blair replied breezily. "I've got a good crew that is able to take care of things when my insane life takes over but I need to keep my hand in."

"You like owning a club?"

"I do," Blair said. "It certainly keeps me busy but not so busy that I can't take care of my kids. It's nice to have something of my own again. Do you really think you should be driving?"

"I know how to get to Capricorn," Todd said defensively. "Besides, you scare the shit out of me when you drive."

"Nice."

"It's true," Todd insisted. "You think every car you drive is a tank with a Ferrari engine. It's horrifying. I've faced death countless times and being in the passenger seat with you at the wheel is still one of my greatest fears."

"Your sense of humor is still intact," Blair said sourly. "If I'm such a lousy driver why haven't I ever gotten a ticket?"

"Well, you have run at least one person over which is more than I can say for me," he paused. "Have you run anyone else over while I was gone?"

"No, but if you get out of the car I'd be happy to oblige."

"No one threatens my life like you, Blair," Todd grinned. "It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy."

"I bet."

"I missed you," he glanced her way.

She didn't respond. She looked out of the passenger window and Todd thought he heard a quiet sniffle. He decided not to push and they drove in silence the rest of the way to Capricorn. Once they arrived, Todd hurried to open the door for Blair and help her out of the car. She smiled gently at him and they proceeded inside.

"Bar, booth or table?" She asked as they walked in.

"What?"

"Do you prefer bar, booth or table?"

For a moment, he had the scintillating image of making love to her in all three locations flash through his mind. "Um..." he cleared his throat. "Uh... table."

Blair nodded and checked with the hostess before beckoning to him to follow her. "I have a few things to check up on so you're going to be on your own for a little bit."

"No problem," he asserted. "I'll just soak up the atmosphere."

A jazz trio, made up of a guitar player, a drummer and a standing bass, was currently playing an instrumental version of 'Pennies from Heaven' as Blair sat Todd down and was off in a flash of purple and gold.

"Welcome to Capricorn," a blonde girl appeared at Todd's side. "I'll be your server, Aubrey, can I get you a drink?"

"What's on tap?"

As Aubrey rattled off the names, Todd looked around her to see where Blair had gone. She was over at the bar talking with her bartender when Cristian Vega walked up to her to get her attention._ Damn, that little twerp is still hanging around?_ Todd noticed that his server was suddenly quiet awaiting his order. "Yeah, I'll have the stout." She went to place his order and Todd got a better view of whatever Blair was doing with Cris.

Talking, mostly. And going over lists and paperwork.

Todd relaxed. It wasn't that he was ever threatened by the kid. He was just annoyed by his presence. He was territorial about Blair, it was as simple as that. Plus, there was the added bonus of Cris being the first suspect when Blair lost their baby to a mugging. And then making out with her in a store-room years later.

The guy just annoyed him.

Todd focused on everything else to get his mind off bad memories. The club wasn't that different from what he remembered. Slightly darker, maybe, with a more intimate feel about it. He remembered Blair singing 'My Funny Valentine' to him on opening night dressed in a sexy red halter top and red pants

"Here you go," Aubrey returned with his beer. "Can I get you anything else?"

With visions of Blair singing in his head, Todd remembered Starr telling him about the schedule. "Yeah, do you have a schedule of performances?"

"I can certainly get that for you!"

Was it his imagination or was she being overly friendly? Todd took a drink of his beer and closed his eyes in ecstasy. The beer that John McBain had in his hole of an apartment was on par with the shit he sucked down during his penniless days at Motel Hell. And Viki didn't have anything worth drinking except the bourbon she apparently had on hand for Clint and his transplanted heart.

This, however, was dark and rich and slightly bitter. He hadn't realized how much he missed truly good beer until just that moment. Of course it would be Blair's place that reintroduced him to the good stuff.

"Here you go!"

Todd was ripped from his malt inspired reverie by his server returning. He took the schedule from her and scanned it looking for Blair's name.

"Are you looking for any performer in particular?"

"Blair Cramer," he grunted.

"Oh," her enthusiasm dimmed slightly. "Are you a fan?"

"You could say that," he glanced up at her. "You could say I'm her ex-husband, too."

"Oh," Aubrey didn't seem to know how to respond to that. "Oh. Well, can I get you anything else?"

"Not right now."

"Okay then..."

Todd barely noticed her drifting away as he poured over the schedule making mental notes to be at Capricorn on the nights that Blair sang. He had dreamt of her singing while he was gone, he had remembered every song she ever sang to him, every time she had hummed to herself while working or putting on her make up or brushing her hair and the thought of her beautiful voice made him ache inside.

He sat and listened to the music, nursing his drink, while Blair made the rounds. She was easy to keep an eye on with that golden dragon wrapped around her body and he did his best to not stare too hard.

When the trio took a break, Blair finally sat down with him bringing a glass of wine with her. "Sorry..." she smiled with a gentle shrug of her shoulders. "I've been away a little too long it seems."

"Vega works here?"

"Not for too much longer," Blair said, a flicker of sadness marring her lovely features. "He's helping the new managers transition before he heads off to Barcelona to teach art."

Todd didn't want to talk about Vega. "You look beautiful, I didn't get the chance to tell you before."

She preened. "Thank you."

"That dress is..." he let his eyes travel over her curves, "really something."

"I have developed something of a fondness for dragons."

He smiled remembering the fairy tale he told her in bed one night when she couldn't sleep. She had been so fragile and all because of Max. "Dragons look good on you."

The coquettish smile he received in response told him his double entendre had been heard loud and clear. She looked at his drink. "What did you order?"

"Oh," he sighed rapturously. "The oatmeal stout. Babe, I gotta tell ya... I have missed good beer. I never had it so good as when you were buying me drinks."

"The good old days, hmm?" She sobered a bit. "Can I ask you something seriously?"

"Yes," whatever it was, it was important and he was determined to show her that he was entirely able to be serious when she needed him to be.

"How did you escape?"

He tensed for a moment and she reached across the table and touched his hand. He slid his fingers against hers so that they were intertwined and stared down at them for a time as he sorted the thoughts out in his head. _Anything she wants,_ he promised himself. "They were going to kill me," he began.


	6. Chapter 6

Recounting the tale of his escape wasn't easy but Blair was quietly encouraging the whole time and waited patiently as he sorted everything out in his head. When he got up the nerve to look her in the eyes during his recap he noted a hardness there. She didn't seem upset _with_ him more upset _for_ him and found that as encouraging as anything else.

She listened to him, so completely focused on what he told her that she got that familiar little furrow between her brow. Todd found himself smiling in spite of himself. It was exactly how things were at the premiere. He was so happy to see her face, look in her eyes, be in her presence that the smile came unbidden.

He could see the wheels turning in her head as he recapped his escape but when he revealed the presence of Patrick Thornheart at the same compound that shocked her into speech again.

"Wait... what?"

"Thornheart was there."

Blair shook her head. "He's supposed to be dead," she told him. "Marty was on the phone with him when he was killed. It's one of the few times I legitimately felt sorry for her."

Todd raised an eyebrow. "I don't care if he's supposed to be dead, Blair. He's not. I _saw_ him. I hitched the ride on the plane with him that brought him here to Llanview so they could pick up Marty and send them off to God knows where. That's where I saw Victor for the first time."

"So he did get Marty out of town," Blair muttered, shaking her head. She sat back in her chair, gnawing on her lip, and her eyes focused on the table-top.

He watched her for a moment. She remained silent but her eyes darted about on the table-top, as if looking at several small pieces of something. The furrow between her brow deepened and her fingers drummed against her arm. She was thinking hard, he could tell. Trying to figure out something vital. "You okay?"

"Do you know _when_ you broke out?"

"Not really," Todd admitted. "My timeline is questionable at best. I'd retreat so far into my head that when they'd pull me out I'd have no idea how much time I was there."

"But you got out in time to catch this plane that was on its way to Llanview in order to pick up Marty," Blair said slowly, still trying to piece the puzzle together. "And Patrick wasn't dead... he was in the same facility you were in. You must have been hanging around Llanview for at least a month, then. But they wanted to kill you before that..." her face darkened dramatically.

"What?"

"It would have been too late," Blair whispered.

"What would have been too late?"

"Tomas didn't tell us about Victor not being you until August," Blair said, her voice shaking. "Which would have been about two months too late based on everything you've told me. If you hadn't escaped..." her voice broke. "If you hadn't, you would have survived all that time for us to miss saving you by just a few months." Her hands balled into fists that she slammed onto the table. "It would have been too late!"

Todd reached forward and took one of her fists into his hands. Slowly, he worked one finger in between her balled up ones and got her to release her fist. He held her hand with one of his and stroked it gently with the other. "I got out."

"You shouldn't have had to do it alone," Blair said mournfully. "You should never have been left there in the first place."

Todd was silent for a long time. "Do you remember when we went sledding?"

Blair looked puzzled. "Of course, I do."

"Remember when he sat there in the snow afterwards? When we talked?"

"Yes."

"I said I felt I had been cut off... from everything that had been my life... no friends, no family, no future... just cut off, floating away like an astronaut that had been let go on a space walk or something."

"I remember."

"I think I was better off like that."

"Don't say that, Todd," Blair murmured, gripping his hand with her fingers.

"I mean, I wanted to know where I came from, where I belonged and I just keep finding out awful things about the people that made me. Victor Lord was certainly no picnic. Peter Manning wasn't much better."

"Well, it's done now."

Todd stared at her for a moment. "What?"

"They're all gone. Victor is dead, Peter is dead, Bitsy is dead and Irene is dead. They're all dead. For real this time as opposed to the fakeouts we've been subjected to. _They're_ gone. _You're_ here."

It often took him aback whenever Blair's voice took on that steely tone. He would get so used to the soft way about her, her gentle touch, her gentle voice, the soft look in her eyes, that being exposed to the steely undertones that existed at her core somehow surprised him. He didn't completely understand why, her strength was one of the things he loved most about her. "So, what... just get over it?"

"What are your other options?" Blair asked. "Dwell on these people, three out of four who were awful to you? You have your life, you need to take care of getting your life back and reclaiming what was taken from you. Nothing you do from this point on has any effect on any of your parents but it has a hell of an effect on your kids. Think about that." She glanced at her watch and stood up. "I have to get back to the house. If you want to stay here, that's fine. We close at one. I can take a cab."

"No," Todd got to his feet. "This was us going out," he frowned slightly. Blair's walls were back up and he wasn't exactly sure why. "You know, the whole courting thing."

"Right," Blair went to say a few final words to some of her staff before nodding at him and heading towards the door.

* * *

"What's with you?"

"What's with what?"

"You," Todd said as he pulled out onto Front Street from the tiny parking lot behind Capricorn. "You were in a pretty good mood before. Now you're angry."

"I'm not angry."

"You're not happy," Todd glanced at her when they reached a stop light. "Was it something I said?"

"Yes and no."

A silence stretched out between them.

"Okay," Todd sighed, getting a little annoyed. "You want to explain that?"

"When you were telling me about your escape..."

"You asked about that!"

"I know."

"I didn't hold anything back, I told you the truth," Todd snapped.

"I..." Blair sent a discerning look his way. "I didn't say anything about that!"

"Then what?"

"I have to think about things," Blair muttered. "It just reminded me that I have a few loose ends left to tie up."

"Like?"

"Like, you worry about your business and I'll worry about mine."

"You _are_ my business."

"Now," Blair's patience snapped. "Don't start getting all possessive and nosy and... and... _you_," she hissed. "My life is my life and I'll handle it the way I see fit, you got me? You have to figure out how you're even going to reclaim your name so don't start telling me what I need to do!"

"I'm not telling you what you need to do," Todd attempted to placate her. "I just want to be a part of it!"

"That's not up to you!"

"No, it's up to you and I'm asking you to let me be a part of it!" Todd huffed. "I mean, that's something of a huge step for me, wouldn't you say?"

"I guess so," Blair replied grudgingly.

"You _guess_ so?" Todd shook his head. "Why are you always so stubborn?"

"If I wasn't, I'd never have made it this long. I'd have given up long ago." Blair lifted her chin. "Besides, you're one to talk about stubborn. You won't even die properly."

Todd felt a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

"Which I'm thankful for," Blair continued, her voice softer. "In case you were wondering."

"I know that."

"Look, I appreciate what I think you're trying to offer, but I can take care of myself."

That was debatable as far as Todd was concerned. Every time he left Blair to take care of herself she got herself into worse and worse situations. He honestly wondered what it was she was take care of here. "I have several arguments that could refute that, you know."

"You have more than enough on your plate."

"Doesn't mean I don't want to help you with whatever you're going through."

Blair's silence was much kinder than her last one. "God, it's been a long time since I've heard that."

"From me?"

"From anyone," she sighed. "I'm used to taking things on by myself."

"You've been that way as long as I've known you. You're one of the hardest people in the world to help out, you know that?"

"I don't like owing people."

"I don't want you to owe me, Blair," Todd said with all the sincerity he could muster. "I just want us to be on the same side."

"We are."

He decided to leave it at that. Pushing wasn't going to get him anywhere that night and she seemed far less angry than she had been. Eight years of recollection and remorse might have finally given him the ability to recognize when to quit.

For now.

They pulled into the driveway of Dorian's house and Todd ran around the car to open Blair's door for her. He walked her to the door and they stood there for a moment sizing each other up.

"So when can I see you again?"

Blair grinned. "Are you asking me on another date or are you asking when you can spend some time with the kids?"

"Both," he replied sheepishly.

"Call me tomorrow," she told him. She rested one hand on the doorknob then looked up at him again before reaching up with one hand, placing it over his scarred cheek. Her thumb rubbed lightly against his cheekbone. "I am glad you're back," she said. "I'm glad you got out."

He saw her eyes start to harden again and, hoping to counteract it, grabbed her wrist with his hand. His grip startled her and to ease the momentary tension, he turned to press his lips to her palm. He kissed her there twice more and then pulled back.

"I'll call you tomorrow."


	7. Chapter 7

Morning at Llanfair involved nieces and babies and a lot of Buchanan bellowing. Todd was more than happy to burrow under the pillows and shut them all out. He dozed and daydreamed of moving back into Dorian's mausoleum with Blair and the kids. He thought of sitting down with Blair and designing their dream home and wondered if there was a way to make sure it always belonged to both of them so neither one could kick the other one out or move any one else in.

When the house quieted down, Todd ventured a look at the clock. It was only nine but his stomach was rumbling and he decided to get up and forage for food.

Viki was sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of tea reading a book. She glanced up as Todd wandered down the back stairs and made a beeline to the pantry to get a bowl of cereal. "I was asleep before you came home last night."

Todd almost reminded Viki that Llanfair wasn't his home and never would be but thought better of it. She was his sister and she was giving him a place to stay.

"Did you go see Blair?"

"I did," Todd nodded as he shoved a spoonful of cereal into his mouth. "She had a headache and I took care of it and let her have a nap and got the kids pizza and then we went out for drinks."

Viki's eyebrows raised. "I'm impressed."

"Why's that?"

"I would have guessed you'd lose your nerve and then get angry about it."

"Ha ha," Todd replied sourly. "I've been apart from Blair for eight years. You really think I'm going to blow it when I get the chance again?"

Viki shrugged quietly, giving the indication she thought exactly that.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Sis."

"I didn't say anything."

"You didn't have to," Todd grumbled. "You don't like Blair, do you?"

Viki blinked in shock. "Why would you even say that?"

"Because you're not exactly encouraging when it comes to her," Todd drummed his fingers on the table. "You tried to shove me towards Delgado, hell, you practically brain-washed me into thinking that she and I were in love when we were married."

"I thought she was good for you..."

"_Why_ would you _ever_ think that?" Todd asked. "Seriously, Viki, do you remember me back then?"

Viki closed her book quietly, sensing this conversation was going to be a heavy one. "Yes."

"Do you really? Think back... think hard."

"All right."

"Did I seem happy to you?"

"Todd..." Viki didn't look like she wanted to go any further with the discussion.

"Answer me!" Todd slammed his hand on the table. "Did I seem happy to you?"

"No," her voice was small.

Well, that stunned him. He honestly wasn't expecting Viki to own up like that. "Why in the hell would you try to consign me to a life that you knew made me miserable?"

Viki heaved a sigh. "It wasn't quite like that, Todd. Were you happy? No, but I'd be very hard pressed to pin-point any moment you were truly happy once you returned from Ireland. If you recall, Blair wasn't making you very happy then, either."

"That was my fault!"

"Was it?"

"Yes!" Todd insisted. "Because I misunderstood things between her and Patrick! I was so messed up I couldn't see the truth... how much she had missed me, how much she loved me... I convinced myself it had all been lies. And I wrecked everything because I was so damned stupid! Delgado wasn't any better."

"She was different, though," Viki shrugged. "I thought she may have been what you needed."

"Did you ever stop to think that what I needed _wasn't_ some screwed up masochist with a domination fetish?"

"What?!"

Todd rolled his eyes. "You have clearly not been paying attention to Delgado if you don't see that's exactly what she is. You and Sam kept pushing me to be with her. I mean, Sam just wanted to nail Blair himself so I get that but you... why? Why would you want that for me when you knew how miserable I was?"

"I don't know that I realized how unhappy you were, Todd."

"You're smarter than that," Todd scoffed. "Come on, admit it, you don't like Blair. You like Cassie and Kelly just fine. Hell, you're always going on about the wonders of Kelly which I do not get. So why don't you like Blair?"

Viki eyed her brother. "I suspect you're going to tell me."

"I want _you_ to tell me."

"I have nothing against Blair," Viki insisted. "In fact, over the years, I've come to appreciate her a great deal. It takes a very strong woman to handle the things she's had to handle over the years."

"So you didn't appreciate her before."

"Oh fine," Viki threw her hands up in defeat. "She was too much like Dorian."

"Aha!" Todd jabbed a finger at Viki triumphantly. "Ah! Ha! By the way, you're totally wrong about that."

"I don't think I am."

"If Blair were like Dorian, I'd like Dorian. I would have liked Dorian all along," Todd pointed out. "But I don't. Hated her on sight. Still do. The feeling was mutual."

"Whereas with Blair..."

"Blair was always the hottest thing on two legs that I'd ever seen," Todd mused. "Still is. Last night, we went out had a drink or two, talked about some things... she's prickly and has all of these walls up... didn't stop me from wanting to take her inside and bend her over the back of the couch, though."

"Todd!" Viki sputtered. "My _word_!"

"I didn't _do_ it," Todd said innocently. "I just _wanted_ to."

"I really don't think this is the sort of thing we should be talking about." Viki looked completely unsettled.

"Why not?" Todd asked. "I'm actually relieved that my libido is as strong as ever where Blair's concerned. After eight years of torture..." he hedged a little. "You have to wonder if the equipment is working... hell, if the desire is even still there."

"I'm guessing it is?"

"Boy howdy is it," Todd replied cheerfully, enjoying Viki's obvious discomfort. "Admittedly, when I was lurking around trying to get my bearings things didn't immediately pop up, if you know what I mean."

Viki rubbed her eyes wearily.

"But, the image of Blair curled up on the lounge chair in the dark with a glass of wine and that blue dress kept creeping into my head at night," Todd grinned rakishly. "And when I saw her on tv at the premiere and she showed off the earrings that I bought for her for our wedding..." he sighed. "I knew I had to go to her. It was like she was calling out to me without even knowing it."

"Really."

"And when I saw her..." Todd's eyes took on a dreamy cast. "When I saw her there in this white, drapey thing... all I could see was her and Starr and Jack. My family. My babe." He shook himself out of his reverie. "You should have seen her last night in this hot, tight purple thing with a gold dragon all wrapped around her. Let me tell you, Viki, I wanted to wrap my dragon all around her and then some."

"All right," Viki shot out of her seat and went to wash out her teacup. "I really don't think this is an appropriate conversation to be having."

"Well, why not?" Todd asked. "I had a lot of time to think, Viki, and we both know that I carry around some serious issues when it comes to the boudoir, right? Not _problems_, mind you," he corrected sternly. "Everything works fine and I know what to do and where things are and all of that."

"Really!" Viki looked horrified.

"But, you know, all that stuff with Marty made me rethink my entire life and Blair was the woman who actually engaged in a healthy sex life with me. She's the only one who ever did."

In spite of herself, Viki found herself interested in that aspect of it. "Really?"

"Yes," Todd cocked his head at his sister. "Oh... that's right. We weren't exactly tight when Blair and I were married the first time. Plus, you were going through your own shit."

"Language!"

"Well, you were. But it's true," Todd leaned back in his chair. "Peter, as you know, was a creep and he treated people like crap. Didn't matter who they were, he shit all over them."

"Again, language!"

Todd rolled his eyes. "So, after seeing him treat Bitsy and then every other woman in his life like... property, that's how I thought I was supposed to behave. And it's how I did behave. I treated women like whores. Some of them consented to it, some of them didn't... the point is that I was conditioned to be a certain way and after Marty and therapy I saw that it wasn't supposed to be that way at all.

"Rebecca was too skittish for me in the long run. Looking back, I don't think I could have engaged in a healthy sexual relationship with her. She was really repressed which, at the time, appealed to me because I don't think I could have handled an in your face woman... a sexually aggressive one, you know? I met Blair in the midst of all that Powell crap and, man," he grinned at the memory. "She was as opposite Rebecca as you can get. Tall, tough and fearless... she threatened to mace me once."

"Did she?" Viki's tone was droll. She still wasn't certain about the subject of this whole conversation but Todd seemed to need it. She'd just try to tune out the things that made her squeamish.

"I came onto her at Rodi's one night," Todd chuckled. "Hard. I was drunk, I admit, but she came in and sat down at the bar and she was just so _hot_. I mean, how could I resist? She totally turned me down but she did it so casual. It was like she didn't even take me seriously at all but she didn't hold it against me, either. She was always just this really cool headcase of a chick. I liked her."

"You say that like it's unusual for you."

"How many people do I like, Viki?"

"You have a point there."

"Blair was the first woman I ever slept with that I actually liked... as a person, as a friend. I'd never had that before. And when we got married we had a lot of sex. Make up sex, happy sex, sad sex..."

"Sad sex?" Viki shook her head. "Do I even want to know?"

"We had sex a lot, to comfort each other, to have fun... I mean, damn Viki, I'd never looked on it as fun before."

Viki looked deeply skeptical about that.

"It was always a status thing. Blair made it fun. We laughed and cuddled and it was just... fun. For a while, sex was the only way I could really express how I felt about her before I worked the nerve up to actually say it." He picked at the table top, his expression turning pensive. "It's why it hurt so much to come home from Ireland and see her with the McPoet. It was like everything she had given me wasn't special after all."

"But it was..."

"Of course it was," Todd snapped. "It's why I didn't do it with anyone else. I just wasn't built that way, I guess."

"You can build a relationship with someone else if that's what you really want to do, though," Viki told him. "You can have that healthy relationship with another..."

"Well, I sure as hell wasn't going to have it with Delgado," Todd snarled. "That would have been right back to square one for me. She saw sex as a conquest. Blair was competition and she wanted to nail me because Blair had and she wanted her piece. She wanted to win."

"Oh, Todd, I don't know... that doesn't seem like something Tea would do."

"Well, how the hell would you know?" Todd demanded. "You weren't there behind closed doors! You didn't know how she'd talk, the things she'd say and do. I was there, Viki! It's exactly how it was! She wanted to win! And I never gave her that part of me because if I did, I knew I'd backslide into the monster I was before I raped Marty." He stared at his sister for several minutes. "I think I know myself pretty well, Viki. I know what was at stake."

It was hard for Viki to give up the idea of what Tea had represented all those years ago. She had honestly seen her as a good, noble woman who had the betterment of Todd's soul as her deepest concern. The way Todd was talking, it wasn't that way at all. Viki wondered if she had to rethink everything concerning Tea and what her relationship was with Victor now. "Did I just see what I wanted to see back then?"

"Pretty much," Todd offered her a smile. "But it's kind of a Lord trait. I do that sometimes. I mean, I didn't want to see Blair's love for me because I was so angry. I learned my lesson, though. All of that stuff put walls between us for years. The mistakes we both made caused a lot of damage but it's not unrepairable, you know? When I saw her... when I'm with her... everything that was always between us is still there. I can feel it. She can, too. I'm sure of it."

"Well, good," Viki wasn't sure what else she was supposed to say about that. "But maybe there's someone more appropriate you can talk about the sex side of things with?"

"Like who?" Todd asked. "You're the only one I'd talk to about things like this. I can't talk to Blair yet because she's the subject of it all and I'm busy wooing her. My sex life is not my children's business. Period. And I don't have any friends. I sure as hell am not going to talk about this stuff with Victor!"

"I wasn't even going to suggest that," Viki waved him off.

"You're my sister," Todd pointed out. "I trust you completely. If I can't confide in you, who can I confide in?"

Viki didn't have an answer for that. Thankfully, Lois came in at that point to announce the arrival of Todd's lawyer. Cybil shook hands with Viki and gave Todd a winning smile.

"I've got good news," she said, setting her briefcase down on the table. "I've successfully frozen the Manning accounts until the matter of identity is determined. I've also placed an injunction on The Sun in regards to reporting on this case until identity is determined."

Todd raised his eyebrows, impressed. "How'd you manage that?"

She fixed him with an acidic glare. "Because I am very good at what I do. As opposed to your former attorney who was not very well prepared for the case I presented. For that matter," Cybil handed Todd a form. "This is a court order for you to submit to some medical testing. The 'other Todd Manning' has been given the same order. You're to comply within the week so we can compare the two with your medical records and move forward with determining who's identity belongs to whom."

Todd took the form and nodded. He wasn't all too thrilled with the concept of medical tests especially after the treatment he got at Irene's compound but if it put to rest the question of identity, he'd muscle through it.

"Ms. Lord," Cybil turned her attention to Viki.

"You may call me Viki."

"Very well, are you ready for our meeting?"

Viki gave Todd a questioning glance.

He took the hint. "Yeah, I'll leave you two alone." He headed up the back stairs to shower and change. As he ascended the steps, he wondered what Blair was up to.

* * *

September was when the humidity finally started to ease up. Blair stood in the park and studied the trees. They were still full and lush but she could see the changing of the seasons already. Hints of yellow-green around the edges and even some leaves on the ground. Soon autumn would be out in all of its colors. The kids would need all of their winter clothes out and Blair was already trying to figure out what Thanksgiving and Christmas were going to look like.

But she loved this time of year. Her birthday was coming up in October, as was Jack's, and she planned to take him riding before the weather got too cold. She looked forward to building fires in the fireplace, hot cider, cocoa, Halloween, mulled wine and snuggling under blankets.

Todd's presence filled her mind and she wondered just how he was going to fit into things. He had announced his intentions and that still surprised her. He had never been particularly forthcoming in regards to affairs of the heart but eight years... it would change a person. It clearly changed Todd. It just remained to be seen how deeply and in how many ways.

"Hey, Blair." Tomas smiled as she turned to greet him. "Here as directed. What's up?"

Blair studied him for a moment. "It's time to talk, for real."

His smile faded. "I see."

There was nothing to do but be blunt. "This isn't going to happen. You and me. It just... isn't."

"Because of Todd?"

"Partly," Blair shrugged. "It's a lot of things, though." She took a deep breath to steady herself. "You have been lying to me from day one."

Tomas sighed and looked down, shaking his head.

"I was honest with you," Blair continued. "Completely honest. But you... never told me the truth. I'm willing to bet you're still keeping things from me."

"Blair..."

"Tell me about Patrick Thornheart."

Tomas eyes snapped up to meet hers. They narrowed slightly as he seemed to gauge what she was saying. "What do you mean?"

"He was in the same compound Todd was in," Blair said. "Although I suspect you know that."

"Where are you getting this from?"

"From the man who hopped on the plane that brought Patrick here to pick up Marty Saybrooke and spirit her out of town," Blair placed her hands on her hips, daring Tomas to refute her. "From the man who was in that prison for eight years while you did nothing... from the man who had to escape because they were going to kill him before you ever decided to step up and tell us that Victor was never Todd in the first place! Do you have any idea how close we came to losing him for good?"

"So this _is_ about Todd."

"_This is about you_!" Blair screamed. "This is about you! You and all of the lies you keep telling me and all of the bullshit deflections! 'Do you still love, Todd, Blair? Is that what this is about? You weren't together when he left, Blair. What's the difference?' Do you know how god damn _frustrating_ it is to try to even wrap my mind about what has actually happened here? Do you have any concept of what I am going through in trying to reason this out to my children when I don't even understand what's going on? Do you see how pathetic it is that I've been attempting to rationalize your part in this just because I'm so damned used to men lying to me in order to have me?

"You set yourself up as this man who was honest, who was different from all the others, who was going to lead me out of the morass and into the bright new dawn of an honest, real relationship. You've been lying every step of the way!"

"I have never lied about how I feel about you, Blair."

"Oh, you don't even _know_ me," Blair snarled. "You held onto a picture of me at my wedding to Todd... a picture you took from _his_ hands." The image of that overwhelmed her. The image of a broken and bleeding Todd holding onto that reminder of their happiest moment and having even that ripped away from him. Her hands flew to her cheeks and she turned away from Tomas, squeezing her eyes shut to try to regain her composure.

"I've tried to explain this to you, Blair," Tomas said gently. "I was just doing my job. If it hadn't been me it would have been someone else. Todd was going to be taken..."

"It wasn't someone else," Blair replied. "It was you. And as much as I've tried, it's not something I can ever get over. I believe you had regrets but you never did anything about them. When I came to your door you played a part, when you followed me here and found out more about what was going on, you still played that part. If Todd hadn't escaped on his own, he would have been dead by the time you decided to open your trap. It would have been just a couple of months too late. Can you imagine that?" She stepped towards him, daring him to look her in the eye. "Can you imagine surviving that long, holding on for that long only to die two months short of someone's conscience finally getting the better of him?"

Tomas didn't reply.

"Are you going to suggest that you had nothing to do with Patrick Thornheart's miraculous resurrection?"

"Why would you think I did?"

"I went over the timing," Blair replied. "I went over it again and again and again. Pretty convenient that the man who was responsible for handing Todd over to Irene's organization just happened to come across the baby that Marty kidnapped while she was being hustled out of town. Pretty convenient that we had just spoken of Patrick days before. Are you going to continue to treat me like I'm stupid?"

"You're not stupid," Tomas admitted. "That much is quite evident."

"Why didn't you help Todd?"

"No amount of pull I had, or Calmar had was ever going to get Todd released. He was the focal point of Irene's project."

"What was Patrick doing there?"

"I honestly don't know."

Blair rolled her eyes.

"I'm telling you the truth, Blair," Tomas insisted. "Thornheart's acquisition wasn't when I was working ops. That's when I was out. I only knew of him from updates that Calmar gave me and from some of his work in the past."

"Why didn't you do anything for Todd?"

"It was well out of my hands."

"You could have said something to me!"

"And put you in danger, too?"

"Oh," Blair snorted. "How _noble_. I'm so sorry that you felt you needed to appease your guilt over what you did to Todd by trying to get into my bed. What a load of crap!"

"I did what I thought was best."

"If that's true, then that's very very sad," Blair looked up into the trees again, taking in the light on the leaves and filtering through the branches. "You have a sister and a niece here. Your focus should be on them and helping them through all of this confusion. I am no longer your concern."

"Blair..." He took a step towards her, reaching out with one hand.

She stepped back, waving him off. "If you cared for me at all the way you claim... you will leave me alone. This," she gestured between them, "is _done_."


	8. Chapter 8

Tomas trudged up the driveway to Victor's house. He stood back, looking at it for a moment, wondering why he never thought of it as Victor and Tea's. There was so little of his sister in the decor. In fact, he'd go so far as to say there was very little of Victor in there, either. The whole place just seemed to be pieced together from home decor magazines. No real personality at all.

Much like Victor himself.

He sighed as he thought about his conversation with Blair. He had entertained such hopes for them. In his heart of hearts, he had wanted her to choose him even knowing what he had done because it would have allowed him to let go of those events eight years ago. It was wrong to seek redemption through another but after so many years of wallowing in his past he had hoped that Blair would be the gateway to a new life and freedom from his old one.

Was that even possible? The better part of his life had been spent in special ops and he simply didn't know how to turn that off. Even living eight years as a painter he had never given up the operative. He lived in shadows, always watching his back, always expecting to either be put down or dragged back in. He had spent those eight years under his own Sword of Damocles.

What could he have truly offered Blair anyway? To have her love him wouldn't change anything he had done or any fear that remained within him. If he were to be truly honest with himself, it would have only exacerbated the situation. To put his own dark past to rest, he had to follow through with helping clean up the mess he had inadvertently made. Todd Manning had been taken from his own life. Victor Lord Jr. had been turned into a cypher without his own identity and was therefore clinging to the one that he had been thrust into.

Tomas was going to find the means of proving who was whom once and for all. He would do anything required to help his sister and his niece through all of this and finally put the remnants of Irene's organization to rest. That was his penance. Then maybe he would find some peace.

As he neared the front door he heard his sister and Victor fighting inside. As it seemed to be something they thrived on he didn't think too much of it but prepared himself anyway. Victor had yet to make a remotely good impression on him.

"...some lawyer you are!" Victor bellowed as Tomas entered the foyer. "I thought you were supposed to be the best!"

"This is just a bump in the road, Victor."

"A bump?! Like hell! That bastard has managed to freeze everything that's mine and you call that a bump? He caught you flat-footed, Tea!"

"Blair found him a good lawyer. I wasn't exactly expecting _that_!"

"Blair isn't as stupid as you think she is!"

"That remains to be seen!"

"What the hell is going on here?" Tomas entered the living room, startling both Tea and Victor. He shot Tea a stern look, not appreciating her digs on Blair. He was going to have to get to the bottom of that one.

Tea didn't respond but Victor was all too eager to air the dirty laundry. "Your sister got beat in court! All of the assets of Todd Manning have been frozen!"

"Is that so?" Tomas found that interesting. What was Victor going to do now that he didn't have millions to throw around at anyone who got in his way?

"The judge agreed with Todd's new attorney that Victor might start trying to hide all of his money before the issue of identity has been settled," Tea sighed. It irked her because Victor was right. She had been taken unawares by this Cybil Claremont and it didn't sit well with her. She already had an intern at her office pulling as much information on the woman as possible so she'd know exactly who she was dealing with from now on.

What was even more irritating was that Blair had gotten one over on her. Todd was so completely out of the loop that he didn't have any contacts to speak of anymore. Cybil Claremont was not hired by Viki, Tea knew that down to her toes, so all that was left was Blair. It shouldn't have surprised her because Blair had basically declared her allegiance the second Todd said 'I am' at the movie premiere but she felt blindsided all the same.

When she glanced at her brother, Tea noticed that Tomas seemed rather amused by the turn of events. "So, who's paying the bills while the money's all tied up?"

Victor snarled at him. "It definitely won't be you, you blood-sucker! Maybe you'll finally give us a break and go mooch off of Blair for awhile!"

Tomas didn't say anything. He just offered a benign smile to Victor which only served to make Victor more angry.

"Or has she given you the old heave-ho now that the ugly, scarred up face she loves so much is back in her life?"

"Wasn't that face yours, too?"

"I got an upgrade," Victor sneered.

"Yes," Tea piped up, giving her brother a warning look. "Yes, you did." She went over to Victor and ran her hand up his arm.

"He shows up with that ugly mug and thinks he can just take everything that's mine? That's bullshit. It should _all_ have been mine," Victor continued, his eyes alight with anger. "My paper, my money, my kids..."

"Those kids have always been _his_," Tomas replied, not liking what Victor seemed to be alluding to. _Was Tea hearing any of this_, he wondered.

"They _should_ have been mine! All of it! But he's the one who had it all! But he's not getting any of it back! It's mine now and I'll die before I hand it over! I'm the one who carries the name!" Victor stormed over to his desk, ripping open the drawer and pulling out a ring. He waved it in Tomas' face. "All along, I should have been the one Victor Lord recognized! I should have been the one to get this from the old man himself! Did I ever get the chance?" He flung the ring across the room. "No! I never did! And I'll never get my satisfaction from my crazy mother for that, either! _Because of him_!" Victor tore out of the living room and up the stairs.

Tea shot Tomas a resigned look and followed after her husband.

Tomas shook his head at his sister's back but waited until he heard her footsteps in the upstairs hall before crossing the room to where Victor had thrown the ring. He picked it up and studied it. It was a gold signet ring with an Old English styled 'L' emblazoned on it.

"Yes," he breathed. "I think this is just what we've been looking for." He pocketed the ring and headed out the front door, calling John McBain as soon as the door was shut.

* * *

Todd wandered around the park trying to work up the nerve to go the hospital and make an appointment for the tests Cybil wanted for him. He was never exactly fond of hospitals as a rule. He'd disliked them ever since he'd been hospitalized as a child. He'd never been to the hospital on a good visit that he could remember. It was all gunshots, stab wounds, busted hands, miscarriages, aplastic anemia, strokes and comas.

Still, if it was necessary to get his life back, he'd do it. He just had to work himself up to it.

There was a group of people doing Tai Chi under a large elm tree. He watched them for a moment wondering when that had become a thing. His eye was captured by someone in particular just as he was about to move and he did a double take.

It looked like Addie.

That was impossible, wasn't it?

He looked around trying to spot the nuns that were always on hand when it came to outside days for the St. Anne's residents. The Tai Chi instructor definitely wasn't a nun being that he was a man.

The woman who looked like Addie paused then bounced up and down waving a hand enthusiastically over her head. "Todd! Todd!"

Good God, it really _was_ Addie. Todd stared.

Addie made quick apologies to the instructor and scampered over to Todd smiling brightly. "Oh, Todd, I heard you were back! Blair has been talking about you constantly."

"She has?"

"Oh," Addie's sunny face dimmed momentarily. "I'm not sure I was supposed to say that."

"Well, it's nice to hear anyway," Todd told her. "Um... what's going on?"

"I do Tai Chi here every day when I'm not traveling."

"Traveling?" Todd sputtered. "St. Anne's has gone on the road?"

"What?" Addie looked momentarily confused. "Oh! Oh, no, Todd," she laughed. "I'm not in St. Anne's anymore."

"Where do you stay then? Did St. Anne's go under?"

"I'm fine, I don't need to stay in any care facilities now."

Todd shook his head. "I've gone down the rabbit hole."

Addie stared at him for a moment and then laughed her laugh again. Todd always thought that Addie's laugh would be how teddy bears would laugh if they ever came to life. Hearing her laugh always made him feel weirdly happy. "Like Alice? Oh, Todd. You're so funny."

"Blair didn't mention that you were out and about," Todd commented, grinning at her.

"Blair's had a lot on her mind," Addie turned serious. "You coming back has really thrown her for a loop and she's been trying so hard to have it make sense for the kids. It's hard to know what to say."

"I bet," Todd nodded. He could understand that. He could barely make sense of it all. "I'd like to help her."

Addie gave him a stern look which knocked Todd for a loop. There wasn't any of that faraway confusion in her eyes anymore. Addie was very definitely in the game now. She seemed to be sizing him up. "You've hurt Blair a lot, Todd."

"I know."

She waited. "And?"

"And I'm sorry?"

"I wish I'd followed through and kicked Victor's butt when he hurt her the last time like I told him. He was so sincere and earnest about doing it right this time and I thought he was you..."

"He _wasn't_ me."

"He treated her as if he were you for a long time," Addie explained. "He cherished her and loved her and lied to her and then got mad when she didn't like him lying to her. I thought he was you. He acted like you in so many ways."

Todd didn't like hearing it. He didn't like thinking about how Victor fooled everyone into believing he was really Todd Manning. Nothing about it sit right and he hadn't broached the subject with anyone since he had unloaded on Blair because it continued to enrage him. He wanted to understand but all he did was get mad.

"You know, I've missed seeing that scar."

Todd grinned ruefully. "You may be the only one, Addie."

"No, I'm not. Starr missed it, too. But mostly Blair. She missed you. She missed you even when you were still here."

Well, Addie may not have had to stay in St. Anne's anymore but that didn't necessarily mean she made that much sense. Todd shook his head. "What?"

"You hurt her, Todd. You hurt my beautiful girl because all you did was lie to her. If you want her back and I know you do, you have to promise me something."

Todd was almost afraid to ask. "Promise what?"

"_Don't lie to her_!"

He heaved a sigh. "Addie..."

"She's on your side, Todd."

"I know that."

"Do you?" Addie's gaze was frighteningly intense. "She's not a pawn for you to move around. She's smart and brave and will do anything for the people she loves."

"I know," Todd's voice dropped to almost a whisper.

"I ruined the trust that you had in her all of those years ago," Addie said sadly.

"What?"

Addie sighed. "Max Holden pretended to care about Blair... he promised me that he only wanted to help her and that's why I told him that Blair lied about the baby."

Todd was stunned. All of those years and he never knew that it was Addie who told Max about Blair's lie.

"I thought he was my friend... he lied to me because he wanted to hurt Blair and because I couldn't tell the difference, I was what he used to do that. He used one of the two people she loved and trusted the most to hurt the other. I thought you had gotten _past_ all of that."

"I did... I got over that first lie years ago."

"Why did you turn on her after that?"

"Thornheart," Todd shoved his hands in his pockets angrily. "Coming home and seeing her with him..."

"She thought you were _dead_."

"And then she lied about being with him!"

"Do you blame her?"

That tripped him up. "What? I... what do you mean?"

"She spent a year fighting to hold onto the things you built, and to bring your daughter into the world, trying to hold onto to any part of you. None of that was easy, you know. She thought you were dead and it broke her heart," Addie shook her head. "When you came back, her dream had come true... she was scared to death of ruining that. She was afraid that telling the truth about Patrick would drive you from her again... just when she had got you back. And in the years after that, it wasn't _her_ lies that drove you apart it was _yours_.

"Every time you'd be together or come close to being together, she'd be so happy and then it was all destroyed. So I'm telling you now, Todd. If you want to be with her, don't lie. Don't treat her like she's stupid. Don't manage her. Go back to those days when you were both so happy... when you believed in and trusted each other."

He wanted to argue but he couldn't. Addie was right. He had gone over all the mistakes for the past eight years. He'd played them out in his head over and over and over again trying to hold onto every shred he could. It wasn't just Blair's lies when he came back from Ireland that made a mess of things. His relationship with Tea had thoroughly damaged what little trust and faith he had built up in his life.

He had no intention of making those mistakes again.

"You know, Addie. You've still got more on the ball that just about everyone in this town."

* * *

John inspected the signet ring that Tomas gave him. "You think this is our ticket to find out the truth?"

"It's the first thing I've been able to find that I honestly believe would be a reasonable place to hide this chip," Tomas opened the messenger bag he had with him and took out a bizarre looking headgear. It looked like a cross between lab goggles and half a wielder's mask. He held it out to John.

John took it, giving Tomas an uncertain look. "What the hell is this?"

"It's a jeweler's magnification lens."

"You just have this?"

"It's useful," Tomas gave him a significant look. "Very useful. Put it on and take a look."

John did so and looked at the ring. "What am I looking at?"

"You can see the ring has been altered. The gold is slightly rough just below the edge of the signet, like it was filled in or painted over or something."

"I do see that," John nodded and took the headgear off. "I think we should bring Manning in. Seeing this, he might remember something."

"What if he doesn't?"

"If he doesn't, no harm done, we'll still look into it. I just think having him in is the right move."

"It's your call, McBain."


	9. Chapter 9

Blair sat in the living room at the desk tapping furiously into her laptop. Jack was on the couch doing his homework. Ever since he'd been put on probation from his bullying of Shane Morasco, he did his homework in Blair's presence.

He'd never say it out loud but he actually liked the alone time he got with his mother. He was reading his designated chapters of _Lord of the Flies_ and the tap tap tapping of his mother's fingers on the keyboard settled into a comforting white noise. The book itself was something that grew more and more disturbing with each chapter and it didn't help that the character of Jack was a major talking point in class.

When they discussed the book in school the repeated references of Jack reverting to a primal nature or Jack using fear to keep the other boys in line, Jack himself noticed an increasing number of sidelong glances being directed at him.

Brad was now in a different school and Beth had gravitated to the cheerleaders now that she had made the team. The cheerleaders were all about the football team in the fall. Over the winter they'd switch allegiance to the basketball team and in the spring soccer and baseball split their attentions. Jack had a feeling that Beth would be all about baseball come the spring. He couldn't say he'd be too bothered by it.

When he got in trouble for Shane's bullying he noticed that the number of 'friends' he had dissipated over-night. The only guys that would still hang out with him were his soccer teammates and even they were less boisterous and open than they had been before. The one difference was that the captain Tyler Givens, a senior this year, had taken particular notice of him and not in a cruel way.

Jack was somewhat suspicious. What would a senior want with a sophomore anyway? The rest of the team had followed Tyler's lead and not ostracized him and Jack was left not knowing what to think or feel about it.

His whole life felt like that lately.

He finished his chapters and set the book down. He looked outside the French doors into the back patio. More leaves had drifted down from the trees. Normally, he'd get excited about this time of year because it meant his birthday was coming up.

He had no idea what he wanted other than for his life to make sense again. It wasn't exactly something you could buy at a store or put in a box. If he had to go back and remember when he felt good about things it was right before Starr ran off with Cole to have sex. After that, things turned into a steaming pile of misery that just kept getting bigger. How many times had his mother almost died since then? It was ridiculous and that wasn't even counting the times she almost died before that... or the time they all thought she was dead.

The worst was when his Dad, who apparently wasn't even his Dad, decided that he just didn't care that much about them anymore. And now this other guy was here and working like hell to connect with all of them. Starr believed him but she believed the other guy, too. Sam liked him but Sam was just a little kid. Jack watched his mother. She had been different from the moment she had seen the other guy.

And his Dad who wasn't his Dad? He'd barely made any contact with him since the first round of DNA tests. Someone had tried to kill him and he had to find out through Starr and John McBain. His Dad who wasn't his Dad hadn't even bothered to tell him himself. Dani had talked to him a few times at school but she had her friend Destiny to talk to and, besides, she didn't know what was going on. Dani wasn't a Manning, he just didn't see it. Mannings needed to know things and Dani just blithely went about her day without any curiosity as to what was really going on.

He looked at his Mom again to see her dabbing her eyes with a tissue and closing up her laptop. "Mom? You okay?"

"I'm fine," she sniffed, her voice slightly shaky.

"You don't look fine."

She laughed lightly and shot him a teasing warning look. "I'm just going over the last eight years, writing down everything I can remember... it's tough."

"Why?"

"I'm reliving all the mistakes I've made," she sighed. "Have you ever heard the expression 'hindsight is 20/20?'" She got up from her chair and came over to sit next to him on the couch.

Jack nodded silently.

"Well, it's true. When you look back at the decisions you've made you see exactly where you went wrong. And that's what I'm seeing as I'm trying to piece together. It's... depressing, to be honest." She reached forward and flicked the one curl of Jack's hair that always stuck out. "I know this all must be so hard and confusing for you. I wish I could make it all better."

"It's not like you have a time machine, Mom."

Blair stared at him for a moment and then threw her head back and laughed.

"What?"

"You're not going to like this," Blair shook her head. "But your father, your _real_ father, Todd, said those words to me once upon a time."

"So," Jack scowled. "Everyone always said I was just like Dad... now it means a completely different guy?"

"Victor was programmed to be like Todd," Blair reminded him. "And at first he was like him... so much like him. Things began to change though..."

"Hindsight is 20/20?" Jack snarked.

"Yes, exactly," Blair sighed. "You are like your father, though. And I want you to know, Jack, that isn't a bad thing."

Jack looked skeptical.

"Todd made a lot of mistakes in his life. A lot of them," she laughed ruefully. "But he regretted them, too. And, in his own way, he tried to make up for them and he tried to be better. He knew when he was wrong, Jack. It's truly one of his better features."

Jack chewed on that thought. "You know, when he was here the other day, we talked a little bit."

Blair found that encouraging. "Really? What about?"

"Just things... but I did tell him about Kelly having Duke's baby."

"Did you?" Blair's amusement over that could not be denied. The sly grin on Jack's face was precious. She could tell he enjoyed being the star of the moment regarding filling Todd in on various goings-on during his absence. "How'd he respond to that?"

"He thought it was funny and he was majorly grossed out, too," Jack looked thoughtful. "Which was weird in a way because Victor always acted like he wanted to get it on with Kelly when she was here."

"Yeah," Blair sighed. "That 20/20 hindsight thing again. Todd never looked at Kelly as a woman. He always thought she was an idiot."

"Mom," Jack replied dryly. "_You_ think she's an idiot."

"No!" Blair's denial wasn't exactly convincing. "All right... a little bit."

Jack grinned and then sobered. "When we were talking about Kelly, Todd got this look on his face for a moment... it was like the look you get when you think about Kelly sometimes."

"What look is that?"

"This angry, sad look..."

Blair blinked back the tears that suddenly threatened. No matter what, Kelly would always be the person that killed her baby... that left her almost dead on the side of the road... that lied about it while Todd was left raging at the injustice and letting his anger lead him down a road he couldn't come back from.

"_That_ look." Jack pointed at Blair's face. "You're thinking about the baby Kelly killed, aren't you?"

"Yes," there was no point in pretending otherwise. "That moment... that night... it lead to a lot of heartache and misery between your father and I."

"Hindsight again?"

Blair smiled. "Yeah, it's one reason I try not to focus so much on the past... the painful parts of it, anyway. I just try to carry on." She looked at Jack for several moments. "You're a pretty observant kid, Jack Manning."

"Duh," he snorted.

"I'm sorry if I haven't given you enough credit for that, honey," Blair told him. "My problem is that I want my kids to be kids... I don't want to have them grow up too fast. I know what that's like and it's not the best thing in the world. Don't think that I haven't noticed how smart and sensitive you are, Jack Manning."

He always got a little embarrassed when his Mom fussed over him but it was nice all the same. "I'm done with my homework. Can I watch TV?"

"Sure," Blair sent him upstairs to the rec room she had set aside for the kids. She stared up the stairs after him, a wistful smile on her face. Maybe her son, her sweet boy, was finally coming back. She wanted to do more for him, help him find his niche, and hoped that she would be able to do that for him. Victor's influence over the last couple of years had been the most unfortunate. It bothered her because, early on, Victor had been wonderful to the kids.

She went back into the living room and opened her laptop again. When had it all gone wrong?

She typed in two words: The Execution.

* * *

Todd had just made his appointment at the hospital when the phone rang. The phone Viki gave him 'until he got everything straightened out' didn't have a whole lot of contacts in it. Obviously he had Viki, Starr and Blair listed. He also had his new lawyer listed. After that, he was pretty much flying blind.

When he answered the phone, John McBain's gravelly voice greeted him. "Manning... you busy?"

"Why?" Todd asked warily. McBain didn't strike him as a bad sort but Todd just didn't respond well to cops. Period.

"We may have found a break in your case," John replied. "I was hoping you could drop by and take a look."

"Now?"

"If you can."

"Okay," Todd hung up, staring off into the distance pensively. A break in my case, he thought. Wonder what that means. His fingers itched to call Blair but he shoved his phone in his pocket and headed towards his car. He had intended to ask her to come with him to the hospital for his tests so he already had an excuse to talk to her. He was hesitant to put his hopes into anything McBain may have found.

His life didn't tend to have too many good breaks in it.

When he got to the police station, an officer waved him towards John's office without preamble. Todd knocked on the door and got a gruff "Come in" in response.

John was at his desk. The surprise was Tomas Delgado's presence.

Todd stood in the doorway glancing between the two waiting for someone to say something.

"Shut the door, please," John got up from his desk and leaned against it. "I've been doing a little digging."

Todd shut the door and gave John a wary look. "My life doesn't require digging."

"I beg to differ," John grinned slightly. "There is one great mystery that has plagued you for eight years."

Now Todd's interest was piqued.

"Maybe you can identify this..." John reached behind him onto his desk and held up the gold ring in front of Todd.

Todd knew the ring instantly. Victor Lord had given it to him on his deathbed, presumably his second deathbed, telling him that he was his heir. It was in the midst of the mess with Mitch when he had kidnapped Blair and in the aftermath of that, Blair had asked him to leave them all. He couldn't remember a time since he'd met Blair when he had been so lost and miserable.

"Yeah, that's..." just as he was about to say that it was Victor Lord's ring, another memory flashed through his head. It was so intense and so surprising that it actually left him speechless.

He saw himself planting a chip inside the ring. He saw himself painting over the black stone in gold so that it looked exactly like it had when Victor gave it to him. The chip... he didn't remember where he had gotten that but he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that this was the reason he had been locked up and kept from his family for eight long years. He sat down heavily in a chair, gripping the armrests so tightly that his knuckles turned white.

"Manning? You okay?"

Todd squeezed his eyes shut. He felt tears on his face as he looked up at the ring again and then met McBain's eyes. "That's it."


	10. Chapter 10

When Todd finally dragged himself back to Viki's, he raided the refrigerator and took a ridiculous amount of food up to his room. He locked the door and flopped down on the bed. He felt drained and emaciated. He wondered if he actually looked thinner because he felt every second of his eight years in captivity down to his toes.

They had found it.

The infamous it that Irene had tortured him for had been in Victor's possession all along. The irony was so great it was enough to make him vomit. They had gotten a hold of some equipment and let Todd do the honors of uncovering the chip from the ring. At that point, McBain had called in an officer named Fish who was some electronics wunderkind. Between him and Tomas, they were able to figure out how the chip worked. Todd's memories remained muddled but he remembered bits and pieces.

Fish went home to retrieve a computer he had built in order to use it with the chip and said it would take awhile to make the components work together as well as filter through the information it had on it. At that point, McBain had told Todd to go home because they wouldn't have any new information right away.

Todd was reluctant and hung around for a little bit but saw that it was basically a computer geek talking tech that he was eight years behind on. He eventually decided to leave but not without getting a firm promise from McBain that when they got the thing up and running they'd let him know so he could see what they found.

"I lost eight years of my life because of this thing," he had told McBain, shooting daggers at Delgado as he did so. "Eight years with my children... with my _wife_... while some imposter came in and dismantled everything that I loved and cared about! You do _not_ keep me out of the loop now."

He wanted to put it all behind him. He wanted whatever was on that chip to have the answers. He wanted his life back so he could concentrate on loving Blair, raising his kids, and being a family. He had made so many mistakes. He'd had happiness in his hands so many times and had thrown it away over stupid plots and schemes. He had watched Blair's heart break too many times. Even now, she was more closed off and cautious than he had ever seen her before. He wanted to know what she had been through in these past eight years... who had hurt her to the point where she had turned into a walking fortress.

It was strange that he was the one wearing his heart on his sleeve and she was the one closed off. It was the opposite of how things had been when he came back from Ireland. The upside was that she wasn't angry at him the way he had been angry at her so he had some room to work.

Todd sighed and grabbed a can of root beer. He opened it and guzzled it down, wiping his mouth when he was finished and letting out a terrific belch.

"Goodness!" a muffled voice came from the hall. "Todd?" a gentle knock at the door followed Viki's query. "Are you in there?"

"Yeah," he grumbled. He really needed to get out of this house. A man should be allowed to burp when he damn well wanted to without having to worry about offending the delicate sensibilities of his sister.

"Is everything all right?"

"Just want to be alone, Viki," Todd replied.

There was a pause. "Todd, are you sure that's a good idea?"

"Yes," he snapped. "I'm not on suicide watch, Viki, I just need some time to myself!"

"If that's what you really want," there was another pause, as if she were waiting for him to change his mind, and then he heard her moving away.

Todd flung himself back onto the bed and scrubbed at his face with his hands. He felt stuck and set apart from things all at the same time and he didn't think he'd be able to truly move forward until he had his life back completely. He needed his identity confirmed so he could reclaim his name from his brother. Then he would have his money and his paper back and perhaps, based on what they found on the chip, he could oust Victor from his life once and for all.

* * *

The buzzing of her cell phone pulled Blair out of slumber. She had it snapped open and was saying 'Hello?' in a sleep thickened voice before her eyes could even focus on the clock by her bed.

"Hey..."

Todd's voice, equally throaty, made her flesh tingle. It took her back to the nights when they would lay in bed and talk after waking up and making love. She instinctively reached over to the other pillow, half expecting her fingers to touch his hair. When he wasn't there she felt oddly disappointed. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah... I mean, yeah," he stumbled over the words. "Sorry to call so late."

She looked at her clock and saw the dim numbers glowing 3:28. "Okay," she hedged. "What's up?"

Todd didn't answer for a moment. All Blair could hear was his breathing. "Well... I woke up."

"Okay," she settled back into the pillows and waited for him to explain.

"This happened to me a lot when I was... gone. I'd wake up... sometimes I didn't know when I was or where I was. I mean, I never really knew where I was... but I'd wish I could talk to you... hear your voice... and when I woke up tonight, I thought the same thing. The only difference is that now I can actually do that."

Blair wiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. Why was she so utterly helpless to his bizarre charms? She had been from the very first. "Did you have a bad dream?"

"Not that I can remember. I didn't even wake up sweating or nervous or upset... I just woke up." He paused. "This house is creaky. I think it might be haunted."

She laughed at that. "I don't know about that."

"Do you think it's weird that Viki keeps living here considering everything that Victor did to her here?"

"I hadn't really thought about it," Blair replied. "Maybe she's just reclaimed it for herself. I moved back into the penthouse with all of that crap furniture you bought for Tea after the things you and Tea did to me, after all."

"That's a good point," Todd mused. "And I moved into Dorian's mausoleum even after all the stuff with me and Marty that went down there."

"What stuff would that be?"

"Oh," there was a significant pause. "I never told you?"

"Never told me what?" Blair's voice hardened.

"Well, that's where Marty used to live, you know." Todd sounded extremely embarrassed. "And that's where she and I... um... you know..."

"Fucked?!" Blair demanded.

"Yes," Todd's voice was small. "It was just the one time... before I raped her."

"It better not have been in my room," Blair said icily. "Or the room you and I slept in when we were married!"

"I don't think so," Todd answered. "Honestly, Blair, I really don't remember."

"Or are you covering your ass?"

"I don't remember. Everything in that house looks different. Dorian completely dismantled it when she moved in. And apparently she did it again because it looks completely different from when I was here before."

"Yeah, David did the last remodel," Blair grumbled.

"And I did spend the night there with Marty before we got back together in the stables."

An icy silence greeted that confession.

"I slept on the couch. I didn't touch her," Todd added hastily. "Remember when we went to lunch and you gave me my watch back?"

"When I asked if you were in love with Marty?"

The sound of Todd shuddering came through loud and clear on the phone. It made Blair feel a little better. "I got rid of that notion a little while later in the stables, didn't I?"

Blair chuckled. "That's the second time you've brought up the stables since you've been back."

"Yeah..."

"Interesting."

"Why is it interesting?"

"It's not something you talked about much before. I guess I'm just curious..."

"We had a good time, didn't we?"

"Yes," Blair felt a familiar warmth spread through when she thought about that particular 'date.' The passion, the yearning, the delirious feeling of being in Todd's arms again and knowing without a doubt that she loved him. "That was the first time we made love when I knew I loved you."

"You didn't know before?"

"I didn't understand what love was before," Blair sighed. "I didn't realize that what I felt for you really was love. I was pretty stupid."

He laughed. "We both were back then."

"Sometimes it amazes me we even figured out how to have kids."

Todd snorted. "That was the easy part."

"Says the guy who had to be coaxed into bed in the first place," Blair grinned into the dark. "I have never had such a hard time seducing someone as I did you. And that wasn't even a stand alone moment! You were the most reluctant lover I've ever had. Early in our marriage... in our last marriage. And when you came back from Ireland I couldn't get you into bed for anything."

"Well, once you got me in there things were okay, right?"

Blair caught a hint of desperation in Todd's voice. He had always been so uncertain about whether or not he pleased her. "They were more than okay," she assured him. "The only complaint I could ever make about you, Todd, was that I never got enough."

"We can fix that, you know."

"I'm sure," Blair grinned.

"I'm serious, babe," he growled into the phone. "Your lost prince is home. You open those gates and I can be storming your castle in five minutes."

"Wow. Romantic," Blair said dryly.

"You're going to be the death of me, Blair Cramer."

"What would be the point? You'd just come back."

His low chuckle sent a delicious shiver up her spine. "Look, I do have a favor to ask."

"Ah," Blair nodded. "At last the truth comes out."

"I was going to ask the next time I saw you anyway. I just remembered this. I made an appointment at the hospital... my attorney ordered it. I'm supposed to get a whole work up done. X-rays, physical, the whole nine yards... I was kind of hoping you'd come with me."

"Why?" Blair hated hospitals. She'd lost three children, had a stroke, flat-lined a couple of times and almost been raped in one. She preferred to avoid them.

"Because I hate hospitals and kinda wanted you to be my moral support."

Blair groaned slightly. "When is your appointment?"

"Tomorrow morning at 9."

"When were you going to ask me this again?"

"Um... probably tomorrow at 8:45," he waited. "So will you?"

The fact that he was asking and admitted why he wanted her there broke her resolve. "Fine. Okay. I can meet you over there..."

"I'll come get you," Todd offered. "I'll even come early... maybe see the kids off to school."

"You don't have to do that."

"I want to."

Blair sighed knowing she had lost this one. "All right, well, in that case, I'm going to get as much more sleep as I can. So I'm going to hang up now."

"Night babe..."

"Night Todd."


	11. Chapter 11

They sat rigidly, side by side, in the waiting room. Their eyes darted about as nurses and doctors moved swiftly and silently through the room to tend to other matters. As time seemed to stretch out Blair noticed Todd's breathing grow a little more shallow. When he gripped the armrests of the chair, she looked down at his hands only to see him release them and start doing a strange sort of calisthenic with his fingers. They tightened and moved raggedly, index finger to thumb... middle finger to thumb... so on down the line only to start over again.

Blair looked up at his face. His eyes were squeezed shut and his breath grew more shallow. Then he started whispering to himself. "I have a daughter. Her name is Starr. Starr has a mother. Her name is Blair. Blair was my wife. I had another wife. Her name is Tea. I have a son. His name is Jack. I have a sister, Viki. I trust her above all others... I have a daughter. Her name is Starr."

"Todd," Blair placed her hand on his.

His eyes snapped open at her touch. He looked at her hand on his then at her.

"Get a grip, big guy."

He breathed out a bark of laughter. "You know, if Viki were here she'd be all 'Todd? Todd? Are you all right?' fussing over me like a mother hen. You tell me to get a grip." He took a deep breath. "I always did like you."

"Thanks," Blair smiled. "You're getting too in your own head. You need to think about something else."

"Something other than antiseptic smells, stark decor and heavy machinery that I'm going to be getting physically attached to..." Todd's breathing started to come faster. "Too much like Irene's paramilitary complex of horrors."

"Victor Lord Jr," Blair announced. "Kevin Buchanan. Spencer Truman. Christian Vega. John McBain. Elijah Clarke."

Todd stared at her. "What?"

"Those are all the men I had sex with while you were gone," Blair explained. "I figured I'd better just tell you and get it over with."

"You slept with Kevin?!"

"Todd Manning?" A nurse came in, looking at them expectantly.

"Hey, it's your turn," Blair said brightly. "Go and get whatever done."

"You slept with _Kevin_?"

"Yep," Blair shooed him off the chair. "Have fun!"

"And _McBain_?"

"Yep," she chirped. "Even married that one! Now you can stew over all of that instead of fretting yourself into a panic attack." She shoved him towards the nurse. "Off you go! Quick like a bunny!"

Todd skulked after the nurse his mind racing over the list of names Blair had given him. She slept with Kevin? How did that even happen? She hated Kevin! And the Vega kid? He thought he had warned Vega off of Blair years ago. And McBain? She had married McBain?!

How had that even happened? And who the hell were those other guys? Spencer Truman? Elijah Clarke? He needed to hit up the LlanNet search and find out more about these guys.

Blair flipped through an outdated issues of People without really seeing any of the articles. "Way to take one for the team, Blair," she muttered to herself. "Get him angry at you so he stops freaking out and doing that crazy litany again." She had recognized what he was doing and saying because he had done the same thing when he had been sick with fever up in the cabin. It was a coping mechanism, that much was obvious.

Well, he would have found out about her trail of lovers sooner or later. She wasn't going to hide anything like she had after Ireland. If he wanted to hate her for all of it so be it. At least she was the one to tell him.

She kind of hoped he'd just be angry. If he wanted to know more she wouldn't know what to do. She hated talking about most of those men and what had prompted her to sleep with them and how they had each wrecked her.

"Now, I'm depressed."

* * *

"Okay, Mr. Manning, we're done."

"What?" Todd looked at the nurse, who backed up slightly.

"We're done," she held her clipboard in front of her like a shield. "The only thing I'd point out is that your blood pressure is a little high. Granted, you seem very angry so that might explain that. I would recommend your taking it at home to see if it comes down. As for the rest of the tests, we'll have them processed and let you know when they're ready. So you can get dressed and go." She rattled off everything like a machine gun and lunged for the door before Todd could say anything else.

He had been so worked up thinking about Blair's various sex partners he hadn't even realized what was going on.

"That woman's a genius."

* * *

"So... where to?"

"You can drop me off at the club," Blair said, slinging her purse over her shoulder. "I've got some work to do before the kids get out of school."

"Can I come?"

Blair gave him a hesitant look.

"Come on, Blair," he wheedled. "I've got nothing to do! I can't do much of anything until this identity thing is resolved. I hate hanging out at Llanfair because it's already got too many Buchanans in it. I'm bored."

"Oh, fine," Blair groused.

"By the way, I ran into Addie at the park yesterday."

"Did you?" A grin tugged at the corners of her mouth. "How'd that go?"

"You didn't tell me she was out of St. Anne's."

"Just didn't get around to it. Things have been fairly busy," she reminded him. "And there have been far more important things to take care of than filling you in on my stupid life."

"I want to _know_ about your stupid life."

"Well, Todd," she sighed. "Telling you that Mama was out of St. Anne's didn't seem a priority compared to digging a bullet out of you."

"She told me she was the one who told Max about your fake pregnancy all those years ago," Todd pulled into the parking lot at Capricorn. "I never knew that."

"It wasn't important."

"How can you say that?"

"Because it's true!" Blair got out of the car and went to the back door of the club, opening it to go inside and check on things. Her chef had the kitchen well in hand, sorting through fresh ingredients with his sous and going over the menu. Blair continued through and went to the back office to get her figures. "What would telling you have accomplished?"

"I don't know but it would have been nice to know anyway!"

"Like I'd rat out my own mother," Blair snapped. "Max did her the dirty... it wasn't _her_ fault. She didn't know any better and it's not like telling you would have changed anything." She sat down in her office chair and closed her eyes. "Those were not good times... to lose everything I had come to love and I couldn't even get mad at the person who ratted me out. I told Mama not to trust him but she'd get stuck on an idea and refuse to let it go... 'Max was her friend', 'I really loved Cord', she didn't understand what was really going on..." she kicked the leg of her desk angrily.

"Blair..."

"What?"

"Why didn't you ever tell me about it?"

"When?" Blair turned to look at him. "When we were getting back together? Yeah, I think the best thing in the world for me to do was to bring up the reason we broke up in the first place. You were suspicious of every breath I took, remember?"

"That's because every time I turned around you were cuddling up to David Vickers!"

"And Tina couldn't _wait_ to tell you all about it," Blair sneered. "Have you been bonding with protective big sis since you've been back? Has she hit you up to write her into your will again yet?"

Todd smirked. Tina had been fairly outspoken about sharing his money but he wasn't having any of it. Any time he saw her now she was cuddling up with Cord and fussing over Jessica, Natalie and their two babies. He was happy to keep her there. And he didn't want to get into with Blair about their past with Tina or even the history that they had put behind them long ago. He wanted to know more about what she had been up to while he was gone.

"So tell me about this marriage to McBain..."

"Oh my God," Blair muttered, burying her face in her hands. "Why?!"

"I'm trying to fill the gaps, Blair," Todd cajoled. He could practically see the walls going up around her. An iron curtain surrounded by barbed wire. She was the living embodiment of the Cold War.

"There's nothing to talk about," she shrugged. "It lasted all of three months and wasn't even consummated."

"But you said you had sex with him."

"Before we got married, we had a relationship," Blair's focus was on her paperwork. She refused to even look at him. "The marriage was one of convenience."

"Why?"

"Victor was trying to get custody of the kids while I was in the hospital."

"Why were you in the hospital?"

"Powell tried to murder me."

It was like every ounce of breath left him. "What?"

The tone of his voice sounded alien even to him... he hadn't heard himself sound like that since the time Blair accused him of being happy that their baby had died. The thought, the mere _thought_, that his sick ex-frat brother Powell had laid his hands on Blair and tried to _murder_ her... the very idea that Powell might have snuffed her life out while he was strapped to a chair and unable to do anything about it frightened him to his very core.

Blair shot a glance in his direction. "Look, it's okay. I'm alive and kicking. It's not a big deal."

"It's a big deal to _me_!" Todd could barely get the words out. "Where the hell was Victor in all of this? The guy pretending to be me? Where was he when Powell was trying to kill you?"

"This was after the Marty/Todd love affair," Blair replied sharply. "I wasn't exactly on speaking terms with him. He had called earlier threatening me because I wouldn't let him see the kids although after what he did to Starr and to Marty I don't think anyone could really blame me... and he showed up at the house immediately after I'd been stabbed..."

"Powell _stabbed_ you?!"

"Three or four times," Blair shrugged. "Victor was actually the first suspect in trying to kill me."

Todd could barely wrap his mind around any of this. "They thought that _I_ would try to kill you? Try to _stab_ you to death?"

Blair slapped her hands on the desk. "Todd, I was unconscious. I was fighting for my life. I don't know what they thought or how they went about any of it, okay? I don't remember a lot of it and I don't particularly like to dwell on it. You want details? Ask John."

"Where was _he_ when this happened?"

"Saving Marty of course," Blair's voice dropped to guttural mutter. "I tried to break up with John at least three times before Powell got to me because I was certain that John wanted to get back together with her. Each time he swore that he wanted to be with me... John was in my house, in my _bed_ when Marty called again... I told him not to bother coming back if he went to her. Of course he did. Afterwards, when Victor was trying to take the kids away from me, Dorian hired Tea of all people to represent me and she went with her tried and true 'get married to get the kids' ploy!'" A humorless laugh escaped her. "I tried to tell John no but he felt so guilty about leaving me that night that he just wanted to do anything to make it up to me and I couldn't do much of anything so I finally agreed... it worked for about a week because he took off almost immediately to chase after Marty again. Oh, and in the midst of that, my lawyer, Tea, started having sex with Victor. See, she thought having sex with _you_ was way more important than ensuring my children's safety and because of that she lost my case in appeals.

"Someone's idea of a sick joke. I married two men, three if you count Victor, and every one of them couldn't wait to ditch me to go running off after Marty Saybrooke." Blair picked up a paperweight from her desk and hurled it at the wall.

Todd jumped to his feet when she threw it. His first instinct was to defend himself against the accusation that he had left her for Marty but, at the same time, there was a ring of truth to it. And when he looked at Blair, rigid in pain, there was only one thing he could do.

"Come here," he whispered, moving towards her and engulfing her in his arms.

She remained stiff and unyielding at first but he did not relent, rocking her gently in his arms and whispering soothing words to her until he felt her hands on his back. Her fingers dug into his jacket and he felt her body slowly melt against his. He held her tightly and felt her shiver and then shake as the tears overwhelmed her.

For as long as he'd known her, Blair hated to cry. She certainly hated to cry in front of people and always did her best to not give in. It was ironic because two out of the three first times he met her she was crying.

As much as he intended to just be there for her, he couldn't help but revel in the fact that he had her in his arms again. For as long as he'd been back Blair had remained distant. He'd only been able to touch her a few times and he savored the feel of her now. Her soft cries only made him hold her tighter. He had dreamt of doing this countless nights and he had a strange clash of emotions as he was torn between being happy that no other man had truly appreciated her while he was gone and being angry that no one had been able to see the treasure that she was and love her the way she deserved.

Her cries subsided but she didn't pull away. Todd took the opportunity to indulge. He wound her tresses about his fingers, rubbing them softly and breathing in the scent of her shampoo and perfume. She smelled of exotic flowers and he closed his eyes to take it all in.

For Blair's part, she was also taking the opportunity to indulge in Todd's scent. He always reminded her of the sea... of a rocky coast with wild winds and the taste of salt on her lips. Despite all of the heat he gave off there was always something fresh and wild about him. Instinctively, she turned her face into his neck the way she always did, nestling there in his arms as if it were home.

And she supposed it was.

She felt his fingers playing with her hair and briefly wondered how long they would stand there like that. Would forever be enough?

No. Forever would never be enough time. She would always want more.


	12. Chapter 12

Tomas came back to the house late. He was surprised to find Tea up, papers strewn about her, and a cup of tea on the table.

"Hi," she said wearily, as she viewed him coming in.

"What are you still doing up?"

"Working on this identity case..." she sighed. "Figuring out a way to hold on..."

"You need a different strategy, pajarita," he interrupted before looking around. "Where's Victor?"

"Asleep," Tea gave her brother a shrewd look. "What are you talking about?"

Tomas sat down next to her. "These tricks and feints that you perform in the courtroom are not going to work against fact."

"Fact doesn't mean as much in the courtroom as you might think," Tea replied loftily. "Perception is far more fluid than people believe it to be which makes them so easily manipulated."

"The way you were manipulated into thinking that man upstairs is Todd Manning?"

Tea's face flushed.

"Admit it, Tea," Tomas said kindly. "You were fooled just like everyone else."

"That doesn't matter," she insisted. "What matters is what I can prove."

"If you continue down the road you're on," Tomas told her. "You _will_ lose."

"What do you know?"

"Far more than you," he stood up. "Your best option is to make some sort of peace with Todd. The real Todd. He may take pity on you but he will not take pity on your husband. He may not even take pity on _you_ if I'm to believe half the things they've said about him."

"Todd loved me," Tea insisted.

Tomas moved swiftly and silently off of the couch to shut the doors of the living room. He turned back to his sister, speaking in harsh, low tones. "Is that what you told yourself? Is that what you tell yourself now?" He shook his head. "I was there in that room when he came forward. He spared a glance for you when he grew desperate to prove he was who he claimed to be but it was Blair he wanted... it was Blair that he needed to believe in him... it was Blair he was focused on from the start... I saw him kiss her like a man who had been away from his heart for eight years.

"Pajarita, when I found him he was holding on to a picture of their wedding day. He whispered her name, not yours. If he loved you it was the barest, flickering candle compared to the inferno that burns for Blair... that _still_ burns for her."

Tea's chin lifted. "She dumped you, didn't she?"

"She did," Tomas nodded. "Because I lied to her from the moment she showed up at my door. Because I sat on what I knew not just for eight years but when I came here and knew things were not as they seemed. They were going to kill him, you know."

Her eyes widened. "They... were?"

"Would you have been happier if they had?" Tomas asked. "If he had never escaped and returned here you would have been 'Todd Manning's' true love. Would you have prefered it if he had died and you had kept that particular vanity?"

"That's a horrible thing to say, Tomas."

"Truth often is, I've found." Tomas sighed. "Just know that all of the things you have in Todd Manning's name, this house, this marriage, is not actually _in_ his name. Your life is going to change and what you have to do, my sister, is figure out what it is you _really_ want. That man sleeping upstairs is not Todd Manning but if he _is_ what you want you had best prepare him for what lies ahead. The life he took is about to be over and no trick you pull in court is going to change that."

He turned and opened the doors, going upstairs to sleep. He had carried a fantasy with him for eight years. He wondered how long his sister had carried hers. They both had them within reach and they both had it taken away by a harsh but undeniable truth. Todd Manning and Blair Cramer never loved either one of them. And they never would.

* * *

It wasn't until the next evening that Tea went in search of Todd. She started at Llanfair hoping he would be there and that Viki might be a calming influence on her volatile brother. If she could get Viki to be sympathetic to her and Victor's case, all the better.

"Tea come in," Viki said once she was announced. "What can I do for you?"

"Is Todd here?"

"No," Viki shook her head. "He's at Capricorn."

"I should have guessed," Tea muttered under her breath.

Viki took note of Tea's response. Remembering the comments Todd made about his relationship with Tea she decided to test the waters. "Blair's singing tonight."

Tea's smile was tight. "Is she?"

"Todd has been talking about it all day," it wasn't a lie, either. As the day had progressed Todd became more and more excited.

_"I haven't heard her sing in years," he said. "Years. And now she sings at her club regularly? I'll be there every night she's at the mike, I promise that."_

_"That's very nice, Todd."_

_"Have you ever heard her sing? Blair's got a beautiful voice. She sounds like an angel."_

_"She sang at Bo and Nora's wedding."_

_"Why the hell would she do that?"_

_"The person they had scheduled got laryngitis. She filled in at the last minute."_

_"Well? She's got a pretty voice, doesn't she?"_

_"Yes, she does."_

_"What did she sing? She didn't sing that stupid Nat King Cole song, did she?"_

_"No... she sang a different song... something about love. Simply love or something like that."_

_There was a long pause._

_"Todd?"_

_"That's the first song I ever heard her sing..."_

"I'm sure he has," Tea said dully. "He's been very focused on Blair since he got back."

Viki regarded Tea carefully. "He's always been focused on Blair. I suspect you know that."

"She's always been there first," Tea replied. "Even with Victor, she was there first."

"But Victor doesn't love her the way he loves you," Viki said kindly.

"He did once, though, didn't he?"

"No," Viki smiled gently. "He loved her, or tried to love her, the way Todd did. But he wasn't Todd. No one loves Blair the way Todd does."

"Excuse me, Viki," Tea sighed. "I really have to find him."

* * *

His table had a perfect view of the stage which shouldn't have surprised her. Blair wasn't singing yet so Tea plopped down in the other chair at his table.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Todd demanded, his expression stormy.

"I need to talk to you."

"Blair is about to sing. Sit somewhere else." He craned his neck to see around Tea.

"This is important, Todd."

"Is Dani hurt?"

"No."

"Then sit over there and wait until Blair's done. You're in the way." He pointed at a nearby table and glared at her until she got up and moved.

The lights in the club lowered as Blair took the stage to welcoming applause. The piano began a gentle, lilting tune and Blair lifted the microphone to sing:

_Stay by me and let this moment last._

_Please take these lips_

_Even if I have been kissed a million times._

_And I don't care if there is no tomorrow_

_I could die here in your arms_

_Even if the stars have made us blind_

_We're blind_

_We're blind_

_So blind in love..._

Tea looked over at where Todd sat. He leaned on one hand, gazing up at the stage with a gentle smile on his face. She had never seen that smile before. She had never seen the expression on his face before. She sat there, again, feeling very foolish.

If she had known he had looked at Blair that way maybe she wouldn't have tried so hard to make things between them work. If she had known that smile existed, she wouldn't have believed Victor was him and that he had chosen her.

Or would she?

She had wasted years of her life hoping Todd would look at her the way he was looking at Blair now. She had yearned for Dani to be his so she would have the same claim over him that Blair had. But she knew she could never have that.

She wished Dani wasn't Todd's with all of her heart because now she only wanted to leave behind the life she had desperately reached for with Todd and create a new one with Victor. Tomas was right, she had to prepare her husband for their life as Victor and Tea... the life of Todd and Tea was never real.

Quietly, she slipped out of her chair and left the club before Blair finished her song and the lights came up again. She would talk to Todd later.

She needed to plan.

* * *

"You know, I _am_ perfectly capable of getting myself to and from work."

"I like driving you," Todd grinned into the dark. "Once I get my paper back I'm going to have to give up this chauffeur job anyway. It gives us some one on one time, too."

"You're feeling pretty confident, then?"

"I am Todd Manning," he said firmly. "And it will be proven in a court of law. Tea showed up at the club trying to talk to me tonight before you started singing."

"She did?"

"Yeah," he shrugged. "She slipped out during your song but she's been pretty adamant about avoiding me altogether since she ran out of ways to tell me that Victor had sex with her when I wouldn't. I'm thinking she had a reason to seek me out tonight and it's because she's not feeling as secure in her win as she might."

"A reasonable deduction," Blair mused. "You think she'll try to appeal to your better nature?"

"I'm sure she'll appeal to whatever she can. She's not exactly the most moral lawyer that ever was."

"I thought you liked that about her."

"Like is kind of a strong word," Todd shook his head. "It was useful to what I wanted at the time. But at the time what I wanted really wasn't in my best interest. I think she knew that and preyed on it all the same." He paused. "She's not going to win this. Victor isn't me and he never was."

"He did do his best to get rid of all your records," Blair said.

"What?"

"When we were supposed to get married as Todd and Blair," she explained. "He came into the diner all depressed because he couldn't get a marriage license. He said that when he came to town as Walker, he did everything he could to wipe out all trace of Todd Manning. I remember thinking it was an odd thing to do if he was posing as a completely other guy."

"Have you told anyone about this?"

"I've got it all written down in my journal," Blair said. "Asa 'helped' in the erasing Todd Manning project and we had to blackmail him into using his connections to get it restored."

"This could be really helpful, you know," Todd told her.

"I'm aware of that, Todd. That's why I've been writing it all down, reliving the past eight years, so I have all that information to give to your lawyer."

He stared out onto the streets ahead of them for a moment. "You've been doing that?"

"Yes," Blair affirmed. "When Jack does his homework, I sit down and write it all out and read it and reread it and relive all of it."

"That's amazing."

"Why?" Blair looked at him. "I _told_ you I was on your side. What in the decades long history of our relationship would give you the impression that I won't help you when I say I will? When have I ever left you high and dry? Why do you act so god-damn surprised when I try to help you?"

"Maybe I don't deserve your help."

"Stop it," Blair said wearily. "You suffered for eight years, okay? You were held captive, tortured, God knows what else... you didn't deserve that. You didn't deserve the treatment Peter Manning gave you. You didn't deserve any of it, okay? Viki didn't deserve what happened to her. Jessica didn't deserve what happened to her. And Victor, like it or not, didn't deserve to be raised by your psychotic mother in whatever compound she called home. None of us get what we deserve... it's called life and you either accept what's happened and move forward or curl up and die. You didn't last eight years in that hell only to escape and whine about not deserving help. You are _stronger_ than that. So just _accept_ my help and stop acting like it's some strange and unusual occurrence. I've helped you out when we were far less friendly than we are now."

Well, that was Blair. Todd found himself smiling in the darkness. Sometimes, it was like trying to hug a cactus. "You sang great tonight."

"Thanks."

"That song was really something."

"It's just a song, Todd."

"It's never just a song, Blair." He glanced at her silhouette in the car. "I know you better than that." They drove in silence for a few moments. "I _will_ stay by you."

"Todd..." Blair sighed again. "Look, just focus on getting your identity straightened out, okay? You've missed out on a lot of your life and the only thing you should be concerned with right now is getting your name back, your paper, the things that Victor took from you. You really shouldn't be concerned with me."

"I don't even know what that means," Todd told her. "Ever since I met you I've been concerned with you."

**Author's Note:** The snippet of song that Blair sings is "Stay By Me" from Annie Lennox' _Diva_ album.

"It's just that you've got so much on your plate..."

"So?"

"So, getting all of that back should be the priority."

"Even when I get everything back it's not going to mean anything if I don't have you, too."

"Todd..."

He pulled into the driveway and shut off the car. "What did they do to you, Blair? What did they do these past eight years to make you think that you weren't worth fighting for, too?"

She didn't reply. She just stared down at her hands clenched her in lap.

Todd got out of the car and went to open her door and help her out. "It's like one step forward and two steps back with you," he said as they walked to the door. "I'm not giving up. You're going to tell me what the hell has gone on with you while I was gone."

"When you get everything back you'll have way too much to focus on than getting into my recent past."

"I'll always make time for you, Blair."

She smiled sadly. "We'll see. You should get home."

"My home is right here," he ran his fingers over her heart, feeling her pulse beneath them. "It always has been."

She closed her eyes and sighed softly. He watched her face, watched her try to remain stoic, watched her walls remain strong but he could tell there were cracks. He would get in and he would take care of her and protect her the way he always meant to. Patience was something he had never been good at but Blair was worth it and he intended to prove that to her.

He moved his hand to hers and pressed the delicate flesh of the inside of her wrist against his lips.

More than anything he wanted to take her in his arms and kiss her until the sun came up. He wanted to take her inside to the room they used to share and hold her and make love to her. He laid his hand on the side of her face and looked into her eyes. He had never known anyone so beautiful, so fragile and so strong. His thumb brushed over her lips and with great effort, he backed away and broke contact.

"I'll see you tomorrow."


	13. Chapter 13

"What are you doing up?" Todd came back to Llanfair to find Viki nursing another cup of tea. "It's two in the morning."

"Natalie was up with Liam... and then Ryder woke up and Jess was up with him... I wasn't going to be getting back to sleep any time soon so I helped the girls out and now I'm reading and enjoying some tea." She watched him as he rooted in the refrigerator for something to eat. "How was Blair tonight?"

"I love to hear her sing," he replied, coming back to the table empty-handed. "But man, it's a constant battle just to be near her. You know what she said tonight? She said I shouldn't concern myself with her... that I should just concentrate on getting my identity straightened out."

"That actually seems very practical..."

"Who cares about practical?" Todd asked. "Just yesterday I had her in my arms. She was crying and I got to hold her and be there for her. She sings this amazing love song and then... 'gee Todd, I'm really not what you should be focusing on here.' The woman drives me crazy."

Viki hid a smile. "And yet, you wouldn't be without her for the world."

"No, I wouldn't."

"Tea was looking for you earlier."

"She found me."

"What did she want?"

"Don't know," Todd shrugged. "She sat down in front of me right as Blair's about to sing so I told her to move and wait until Blair was done. She was gone by the time Blair finished."

"Might have been important," Viki offered.

"If it was important, she would have waited."

"It might have been about Danielle."

"I asked, she said it wasn't." Todd leaned back in his chair. "I think she's attempting to parley with the enemy. Maybe she's beginning to realize that she can't pull her 'get married to someone quick' game in the courtroom to give her a win."

Viki sipped her tea quietly. She remembered being rather appalled at the fraudulent marriage Tea and Todd had engaged in to win custody of Starr, especially knowing that Todd still loved Blair. She couldn't pinpoint exactly when she changed her mind and decided to encourage the relationship. It all seemed so long ago.

"Speaking of which," Todd continued. "I understand Blair married John McBain."

"Yes," Viki regarded Todd coolly. "And?"

"What was that about?"

Viki sighed. "As I recall, Victor was trying to take over custody of the children while Blair was in the hospital. I can't say I agreed with his timing or his methods. Attacking when Blair was fighting for her life that way..."

"Is something I'd do?"

Viki nodded. "It's exactly what you _did_ do when you left her with nothing while she was in a coma, isn't it?"

"I was scared to death back then, Viki," Todd explained. "Blair was so angry at me... and the world... and Dorian was coming after me..."

"What would you have done differently?"

"I would have fought for both of them," Todd said. "I would have... I didn't have to marry Tea. I had primary custody of Starr. Blair _gave_ that to me while she was recovering! Dorian didn't have any proof to back her claims." He sighed. "I just wish I hadn't come home to find her with Thornheart. It was like coming home to some nightmare."

"Don't blame her, Todd," Viki told him. "I was encouraging her to move on. We all were."

Todd glowered at his sister. "With _him_?"

Viki looked somewhat abashed. "I didn't realize he was the reason you were shot at the time."

"That's one of the reasons Blair went after him!" Todd exclaimed. "That and she knew Marty wanted him so she decided to take the man Marty wanted because she felt that Marty had taken me." He leaned his elbows on the table. "She said something tonight about marrying three men who couldn't wait to leave her for Marty..."

"I think she might be exaggerating a bit," Viki replied.

"I left her the day after we got married. The day after," Todd leaned his head on his hands. "It's honestly one of my biggest regrets. I've re-imagined my life so many times. What if I never got on that plane? What if I just sent my pilot to get Marty? What if I stayed with Blair and let Marty make her own choices? We would have built that house on the mountain... and had six or seven kids... I'd have been there for each birth. I would have seen my kids take their first breaths and not feel anything but pride and love.

"We would have taken over the world."

Viki smiled. "And now?"

"And now, I see Blair and she's hurt. She's bleeding inside every day because everyone she's ever put her faith in has let her down. And it kills me to know that the I'm the love of her life but I'm the one who has let her down the most. I should have always had her back... always been on her side... but I didn't and I wasn't. I didn't treat her right and she looks at me like a wild thing that's been trapped in a cage. She goes between fight and flight. She gets all sharp and pointy at me like she's trying to provoke me into treating her the way I've done before. She's waiting for the other shoe to drop... she's _expecting_ it.

"I keep wondering... would it have been better to have someone love her while I was gone? To have someone take care of her and protect her and not let her down and leave her on her own? I don't know... and I don't know how to reach out to her and show her that I'm not that man that hurt her and left her to fend for herself anymore. When I say I'm on her side I mean it. I'll be the first one to back her, and defend her... and I'd rather die than be the one to hurt her again."

"Todd..."

"How do I show her that?"

Viki shrugged. "I don't know. But then I don't know Blair the way you do."

"Nobody does."

"Well, then, that's what you've got going for you, Todd. If you're the one who knows Blair best then you'll find a way to show her what she needs to see to believe in you again."

* * *

The September sun was still warm and Blair took advantage of the weather. She stretched out on the lounge chair by the pool a book in hand... the book lay slack against her side as she gazed at the water with half-closed eyes. The warmth of the sun, and the light sparkling off the water lulled her into a peaceful almost meditative state. Her mind wandered...

A shadow under the water caught her eye. She watched it move across the pool until two hands reached up over the side and Todd heaved himself out of the water. He stood there, drenched, reaching up with both hands to push his wet hair back.

Blair admired his broad shoulders and strong arms. She watched the water run down his body, over the dusting of chest hair on his pecs that was flattened and dark against his skin, further down over his stomach and navel. The weight of the water pulled his shorts down almost obscenely low but she didn't mind as it gave her a delicious view of his hip flexors and the tantalizing trail of hair that started just below his navel and crept further south.

He caught her gazing at him and smiled. He turned and walked towards her slowly, his eyes capturing hers before sliding over her body. She could feel her entire body tingling as he approached. Leaning over, he placed one hand on each of the armrests of her chair. His eyes flickered to her lips and then met her own gaze again. A smile tugged at the corners of his mouth and he leaned closer. She saw his lips part as he moved in...

"Blair?"

Her eyes snapped open, searching the yard quickly for whoever it was that interrupted her daydream. "Cris!"

He looked sheepish. As if he knew he had interrupted something. "Your housekeeper said you were out here."

Blair sat up. "Hi... what's going on?"

"I've got the new schedules for the next two weeks and I needed to get your approval for them."

"Oh," she nodded, waving him over. "Sure." She fanned herself with her book, glancing towards the water longingly before shaking her head. Was she really so weak?

Cris waited as she went over the schedule and the other papers he had brought with him. "So... how are you doing?"

She looked up at him curiously. "I'm great. It's a beautiful day, I'm just taking a moment for myself. It's wonderful."

"That's not what I meant," he replied seriously. "How are _you_ doing?"

"Oh, come on, Cris," Blair waved her hand dismissively. "You don't want to hear about all the drama going on in my life."

"I wouldn't have asked if I didn't want to know," Cris insisted. "You brought Todd to Capricorn the other night. Then he came to see you sing. I guess the whole story about where he's been and the Todd we thought was here wasn't really Todd is pretty far out."

"That's putting it lightly," Blair nodded.

"So... how are _you_? I mean, it's pretty obvious that Todd is into you. What's going on with your end of things?"

Blair shot him a suspicious look. "Why are you so interested?"

Cris smiled gently. "Because I know you've been through a lot while he was gone and I thought you might need a friend to talk to."

"Yeah, a friend who's as tight with Tea as you are?"

Cris frowned. "I thought you and Tea were friends now?"

Blair hesitated. "We're not exactly _enemies_ but she's not a confidant, either."

"Ah," Cris nodded. "Well, I'm not surprised. I mean, you don't really confide in _anyone_ much less someone you have such a complicated history with." He sighed. "Tea preys on weakness... even with those she considers family. To trust someone you have to believe that they've got your back no matter what. I understand."

"Aren't you supposed to be close to her?" Blair asked. "That's an interesting way to talk about her."

"I was never close to Tea. I was a kid when we all lived back in the neighborhood together. She was close with Mami. And 'Tonio. Not me." He sat down in one of the deck chairs and pulled it closer to her. "All I'm saying is, if you need someone to talk to, I'm here."

Blair sighed. No one had made the offer to listen to her since... Eli. She rubbed her eyes with one hand. He had offered to listen and things came pouring out and he wound up being a monster. "I don't have a lot of luck with talking to people about... personal things."

"Why not?"

"Because no one understands," Blair said heatedly. "And I sound so stupid when I say that but it's true. I can't talk to anyone about Todd because everyone is already against him. They're too busy trying to come up with reasons for me to not have anything to do with him to actually listen to me. I get it... Dorian really does want what's best for me and I appreciate that but even if Todd had never hurt me she'd still be against him because she hates him. Kelly's useless. Cassie isn't around and even though she tries she just doesn't understand either."

"What about Addie?"

"Mama's..." Blair shrugged. "Mama's living her life as best she can right now. I can't talk to her about all of this stuff because she just doesn't have any real frame of reference."

"Starr?"

"Starr is my daughter," Blair replied sharply. "She's not the person for me to talk to about the fears and uncertainties I have about her father."

"Fears?"

Blair shrugged.

Cris sighed. "Blair, we've known each other for a long time and we've been friends for a long time. Whatever I feel about Todd doesn't matter. I'm not going to try to talk you out of anything. It wouldn't work anyway," he bumped her leg with his foot. "But I can see you're really struggling... you've got to talk to someone before you explode... even if it's just to hear the words out loud. Anything you say to me will go with me to my grave."

Blair studied Cris for a long time. At long last, she sighed and shook her head. "I'm scared to death."

* * *

Todd sat as quietly as he could as Officer Fish carried on a monologue regarding the chip and the information it contained. Eight years was a long time when it came to computers and even though the chip itself had been in hibernation as long as he had, the technology it was able to connect with had not.

"We've set up a completely solitary system in order to filter this information in order to keep our own databases safe," Fish explained. "We have been pouring through the information and there is quite a bit to go through. What we've been able to identify is... very compelling."

Todd glanced over at John. "Have you found anything that connects the information to Victor?"

John shook his head. "No. It's mostly documentation on Irene's contacts. We have Delgado going over a lot of it because he has the most knowledge. We're about to okay calling in his buddy Calmar. What we're seeing so far gives us a pretty good understanding of why Irene wanted this back so badly. How did you get a hold of it in the first place?"

"I don't know," Todd replied quietly. "I don't remember a lot of that..." "It" was everything that took him away and kept him from his family. Todd wondered if he locked down those memories so tightly as a means of hoping to get back to them somehow. There were a lot of blanks left from that time and even the snippets that had come back were focused on his family rather than the reasons why he disappeared. "I'd like to take some of this stuff with me, go over it, try to remember..."

"This is part of an on-going investigation," John said, his face stoic.

Todd frowned. "This is part of my _life_."

John glanced at Fish and nodded towards the door. The younger man got the hint and excused himself. Once he was gone, John focused on Todd again. "Manning, this is a very delicate operation. There is a lot of information we're going through and our goal is to bring down an rogue black ops section of our intelligence agency. That's not something I can just hand over to a civilian."

"That chip cost me eight years with my family..."

"That chip should have never fallen into your hands," John replied. "What you suffered for eight years should tell you that. This is much bigger than you and I am not about to jeopardize an investigation of this magnitude on you. You are a loose cannon on a good day."

"You don't even know me," Todd scoffed.

"To not know you is to know you well. Listen, I had to take you into custody because you started waving a gun around the day you finally reunited with your family," John reminded him. "You are exactly what I don't need mixed up in something this big. God forbid you get your paper back and decide to start flapping your lips on the front page there."

"I have a right to be angry."

"I'm not telling you not to be angry," John said. "I'm telling you not to fuck up an investigation that could make everyone responsible for the lost years of your life pay. Irene is dead at your hands. Baker is dead. His wetworks team is dead. Kent is dead. But this organization wasn't made up of five people. Not to mention the fact that there could easily be more people locked up.

"This is what I do. This is what I _can_ do. I can't give you your eight years back. I can't fix what Irene and Baker did and I can't give back what Victor took under your name. Nothing you do will bring those years back. You want to make a difference? Be with your family. Let me handle this. And let me handle it _my_ way."

Todd scowled darkly as he recognized that John was right. He wasn't going to be particularly useful pouring through the information. He'd hidden it away and then been tortured for eight years. "I don't want to be kept in the dark over this stuff, John."

"I can't grant you open access," John told him. "You're too much of a risk. I can't trust you with information this vital. I can't trust _most_ people with this information. Damn, Manning, I haven't had an investigation this volatile since I was with the Bureau. Every step I take is a potential landmine. You have _got_ to let me do my job. When I come across something I think you can help with, you're the first call I'll make. I give you my word."

"You say that like it's supposed to mean something to me."

John shrugged. "It means something to _me_. Take that however you want. Let me handle this end of things. You should be with your family..."

"You think that's not what I want?" Todd exclaimed. "You think I wouldn't give everything I had to be with them right now? Jack doesn't know me and he's still not sure he wants to. I don't have my paper, I don't have a home, and Blair..." He focused on John again, his eyes hard. "Blair's a damn mess. What the hell did you _do_ to her while I was gone?"

* * *

"What are you scared of?" Cris asked gently.

"You were still a kid when he came back from Ireland," Blair sighed. "He was so _angry_ when he came back... and I was scared because I hadn't exactly been the purest widow in the world. Still... his anger... he was just gone a year. This time he's been gone _eight_. And what he went through trying to crawl back to life in Ireland isn't the same as being held and tortured for eight years." She shook her head. "What does that do to a person?"

Cris nodded slightly. He couldn't imagine it. "So you're afraid of what those eight years did to Todd?"

"I'm afraid of a lot of things," she shrugged. "I'm afraid of him holding the past eight years against me. I'm afraid of that anger eating him up inside..."

"Todd's always angry, though." Cris pointed out.

"No, he's not," Blair snapped. "Brusque doesn't equal angry. Todd's not _always_ angry. That's ridiculous. He can be wonderful... gentle, sweet, attentive and kind. He's thoughtful when he wants to be. He hasn't always been angry even now when he has every right to be."

"He can't blame you for this."

"Can't he?" Blair asked. "Shouldn't I have known? Shouldn't I? Why didn't I?"

"It's not like Victor walked into town and you went 'It's Todd!'" Cris reminded her. "Hell, you had everyone leaning on you to believe it... with proof if I'm not mistaken. I remember Natalie telling me that Kevin had medical files and records and the whole lot. The guy convinced Starr..."

"Starr was a little girl who missed her father," Blair shook her head. "Starr wasn't a hard sell when it came down to it."

"Viki believed it was him wholeheartedly," Cris said. "Why wouldn't you believe Viki? And Dorian believed it too. _Your_ family bought it, _his_ family bought it, why hold yourself to a higher standard?"

"Because I'm the one who's supposed to know him best!" Blair burst out. "And he knows that!"

"I think you're being too hard on yourself. God knows you're used to _that_. Everyone holds you to a higher standard and then they are somehow simultaneously not surprised when you don't live up to it and resentful when you don't live up to it." Cris patted her knee. "You have got to give yourself a break. Victor fooled everyone and he did it with the backing of what sounds like a mastermind of diabolical proportions. He was _supposed_ to fool everyone. You most of all."

"Why do you say that?"

"It's the only thing that makes sense," Cris said. "Think about it. You were the only true obstacle. Starr, as you said, was a little girl. And Viki was never as close to Todd as you were. You were the hardest one to convince and even _you_ weren't convinced by files and medical records. _He was Todd_. He _had_ to be. If they convinced you then they had it made. So they had to take everything they could from Todd's memories to have Victor function like him, right? It wasn't just one thing that convinced you, Blair, it was a thousand small things... things Todd did, things Todd said, the way he'd do something, the mannerisms... it all added up to create the perfect con. Don't kid yourself, they had to target you specifically. I hate to think of what they did to Todd in order to get all of that out of him."

"Me, too." Blair stared at the glistening water of the pool. "Wouldn't that just make him hate me even more, though?"

"Well," Cris sighed. "I've got to be honest, Blair. He doesn't seem to hate you at all."

"_Seem_," Blair repeated. "Victor _seemed_ to be Todd. Victor _seemed_ to love me. Spencer _seemed_ to be a great guy who cared about me and my kids. Eli _seemed_ to be a great guy, too. Tomas _seemed_ to be completely open and honest. _Seemed_ is my downfall, Cris. I can't _seem_ to shake it."

"Are you afraid that Todd's angry at you for these past eight years, Blair?" Cris asked after a thoughtful pause. "Or are you afraid that he isn't? Because if he isn't and he wants to be with you and repair your family... well, you're my friend and I love you a lot... but your biggest fear is being happy."

"That's crazy," Blair denied although her voice sounded hollow even to her.

"You know how to deal with anger and heartbreak and disappointment," Cris smiled. "But happiness? That scares you to death. Why?"

The ultimate question, she supposed. Why was she afraid to be happy? Cris was right. She was afraid and she knew exactly why. It centered on that room with the gold balloons falling on her as she twirled around the floor in the arms of the man she loved. _Those stupid gold balloons and my shining moment of happiness that ended the very next day_. "Because I had it," Blair hissed. "And I lost it. And it nearly killed me."

"What if you have it back? What if you just reached out and took it and you were happy for the rest of your life?"

* * *

"What did I do to Blair?" John asked, wide-eyed in surprise. "What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about Blair," Todd bellowed. "Have you seen her these past eight years?"

"Of course I have," John looked perplexed.

"Then you know what a mess she is because she's been trying to count on people who don't give a shit about her." Todd glared at the detective. "Tell me about the night she got stabbed."

"I'm not having this conversation with you."

"Do not walk away from me," Todd bit each word off angrily. "Blair has already told me some of this but she said that if I wanted details I needed to come to you."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"You were in her bed when Marty called," Todd replied. "She said not to come back if you went chasing after Marty. Do you want me to tell you what she was wearing, too?" Todd actually had no idea what Blair had been wearing but John wasn't likely to call his bluff.

John sighed. "Marty's son had been in a car accident. She didn't call me for no reason."

"That time, right?" Todd asked knowingly. He had a feeling that Marty had been a problem for John and Blair long before that night. "Did you know Blair very well when you were going out with her?"

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

"Did you know that she's got some long, bitter history with Marty?"

John was quiet. His mind went back to a dream he had of Marty standing over him and Blair, disapproving, snide and dismissive of Blair. Yes, he knew they didn't like each other at all.

"Yeah," Todd watched him. "You knew. You knew and you still left Blair for Marty's sake. Why didn't you just break up with her? Why didn't you let her break up with you?"

"Marty was going through a rough time," John said. "The accident in Ireland did almost kill her and she was left unable to walk and she didn't have her memories. That's why Victor was able to prey on her the way he did. She didn't remember _anything_."

"So, you were with Marty before," Todd reasoned, putting the pieces together. "And she got in this accident, people thought she was dead, Victor wound up with her somehow and when she was pulled out of his place she didn't remember anything." He looked at John through narrowed eyes. "She didn't remember _you_, did she?"

John appeared to be getting annoyed so Todd knew he was on the right track. He was always pretty adept at sniffing out weakness in others.

"You didn't dump Blair until Marty remembered you, am I right?"

"I'm not having this conversation with you, Manning."

"Am I hitting too close to home?"

"I have _nothing_ but respect and admiration for Blair," John insisted. "I know she's been through some tough times but-"

"Do not talk to me about your respect and admiration for Blair when you threw her away like trash!" Todd's face was red with rage.

John's frustration bubbled over. "What, like you did?"

"Don't confuse me with Victor, McBain," Todd hissed. "I have made mistakes. But I have never, _ever_ thrown Blair away. I've let her go... I've made poor choices... I've let fear rule me. But Blair has never been second best to me... she's never been a bed-warmer until something better came along... she's never been _my_ mistake."

"You don't know what you're talking about, Manning."

"I don't know that you jumped out of Blair's bed to go play hero to Marty? That, as a result, Blair got stabbed a few times in the back? That she almost bled out and died on the floor of her own home? That you felt so guilty about it that you married her to help her keep the kids and then immediately ran out on her again to go protect Marty? And then you dumped her when Marty finally remembered who the hell you were?" He glared at John. "Tell me how wrong I am, John. Tell me I'm wrong about any of that."

"Are you really going to judge someone else for hurting Blair when you've done more than your share?"

"Back to that, huh? I have no room to talk because I've hurt her too. Well, I guess that makes us equals, McBain. How's that feel? You're no better than I am. You're supposed to be the good guy... the big, damn hero... and you were just as callous with her heart as anyone was. Congratulations."

John stewed over that for a moment, his nostrils flaring in irritation. "Okay, you want the truth, Manning? Blair deserved a lot better than me."

Todd frowned. "That's a pathetic excuse and you know it. Blair deserved better than you but Marty didn't?"

"That's not what I meant..."

"Yeah, whatever," Todd sneered. "Who do you think you're talking to here? 'You deserve better' is just pretty words designed to make the person you're dumping feel better about getting the shaft. 'It's not you, it's me' just done up with a bow. Nothing you say changes the fact that Blair was just fine while the woman you really wanted couldn't remember you... but the minute that changed, suddenly you were undeserving of the wonder that is Blair.

"Well, you know what? You were right. You _didn't_ deserve Blair. You never did. You used her and then you threw her away the second Marty remembered you. You want to know what the real difference between you and me when it comes to Blair is, McBain? I regret leaving Blair for Marty. I regret it with every damn breath. I regret ever making her think that she didn't mean everything to me because she did and she does and you are going to see the real deal soon enough. I have years worth of damage that was inflicted on Blair by the likes of you and my sick ass brother and every other guy she dared to think might care about her to undo."

"Is that so?"

"When you see Blair, the _real_ Blair, you're going to kick yourself for ever letting her go," Todd vowed. "This whole damn town will see her and remember what it was like when we were on top of the world. _This_ time, I'm not making the mistakes I did before."

* * *

Blair poured herself a cup a tea and let it steep as she stared off into space. Cris had left and his words were echoing in her head.

_What if you just reached out and took it and you were happy for the rest of your life?_

How many attempts had she made to do just that? How many times had she shoved others aside to get what she wanted only to discover that it wasn't to be? She chose money with Asa over love with Max and paid for that by losing her jewelry company and Max. She did everything in her power to get Max back but he loved Luna. She tried again with Cord and he could never cut Tina loose.

Her volatile relationship with Todd was more misery and even the times she thought they were happy were just bitter shadows laced with lies one of them was telling. Sam looked at her as a charity case. Spencer was a nightmare. Victor was a sham. Eli crushed her and Tomas was just more of the same.

"Just reach out and take it." She remembered Todd saying the same thing to her right before they made Jack. And look at what that had turned into. A short, bitter laugh escaped her. "Yeah, because it's just that easy."

So many attempts to find happiness. So many attempts to find love. Blair sighed and sipped her tea. Todd was right about her... she didn't believe. The dreams and fairy tales had been crushed out of her long before she ever came to Llanview. He had suggested their fairy tale wasn't over but he had been feverish and delusional at the time.

Blair Cramer believed in love. She just didn't believe in it for herself.


	14. Chapter 14

A week later, Todd was sitting next to his attorney as she won the case for his identity. He felt a strange combination of vindication at finally being proven right and stunned that it actually happened.

As expected, Tea immediately attempted to delay the inevitable.

"I would move to wait, your Honor, as it will take some time for Victor Lord, Jr to establish his own identity..."

"Your Honor, what Mr. Lord has to deal with currently is irrelevant. Todd Manning has an identity. An identity that was stolen from him for well over eight years. It is not up to Mr. Manning to wait for Mr. Lord to return his identity at his convenience. The fact that we have engaged the court this long proves that Mr. Lord has never had any intention of turning over Mr. Manning's identity to him. What Mr. Lord has to deal with at this point is his problem. It is _not_ Mr. Manning's problem. I would move to transfer all identities and properties today."

The judge agreed to push things through quickly and Todd suddenly found himself to be Todd Manning again. Officially and legally. He looked across the aisle at Tea and Victor who both wore stony expressions. Tea had never contacted him since the night at the club and he hadn't felt the need to seek her out. Cybil had actually dominated the majority of his time in the last few days to pour over every shred of information.

It was the medical records that had proven true in the last. Victor's injuries over the years did not match up to what Todd had suffered before his disappearance. Todd, again, thanked whatever he thought might be holy for Blair's choice in lawyer. He couldn't wait to get to Dorian's and tell everyone that he was Todd Manning and he had the identity back legally.

Then he had to go to The Sun and clean up that mess.

Actually, he figured he'd better go to The Sun first and start straightening things out there.

It took a few hours to get the paperwork pushed through and then he took his court order to get himself an official identification card. He made an appointment to get a driver's license and then went to the bank to reclaim his finances.

Tea and Cybil had argued over the finances quite a bit but he was able to take immediate control of the accounts that Victor had taken from him when he took on the mantle of Todd Manning eight years prior. Todd happily threw his court order and identification card at the bank manager and was soon signing papers and getting some pocket change to carry around. He had Victor and Tea's bank cards and credit cards and had them turned over to him. Anything that attached them to his money was back in his possession.

He called a meeting the moment he stepped into the doors of The Sun and explained the situation. He was back in charge. He was Todd Manning and The Sun was his paper. Victor Lord, Jr had no authority there and he promised to go over everything to see that things were running as he wanted them to.

His assistant followed him into his office, giving him updates on who was currently on vacation, which stories were being worked on and what appointments Victor had scheduled. Todd scanned his office and saw a placard on a second desk reading 'Kelly Cramer, Editor' and nearly choked.

"Get me the contract on Kelly Cramer immediately," he told his assistant. She bounded off to do just that.

Todd approached the desk, caught the lingering whiff of Kelly's perfume and immediately moved away. He went back to his desk and took stock of it. He buzzed his assistant to bring him a box as well and then started reorganizing.

Once the box was brought in, along with Kelly's contract, Todd dumped Victor's personal photos into it. He started going through the drawers to see if there was anything else that was specifically Victor's. In the bottom drawer, under a bunch of files, Todd found a framed picture of Blair.

He pulled it out to look at it. It was obviously taken after he was gone. Her hair was longer and wasn't cut in those feathery layers she was currently sporting. Her smile was warm and her eyes sparkled... she looked beautiful. Todd propped the picture up against his computer monitor and leaned back in his chair.

"That's better."

* * *

"Hi Blair!"

Kelly's voice sang out over the phone as soon as Blair answered it. Blair jerked the phone away from her ear in response and couldn't help rolling her eyes. "Hi, Kelly. What's up?"

"Guess where I am!" The sing-song tone of her voice suggested to Blair that Kelly was exactly where Blair wanted her the least. That meant she was back in Llanview.

She desperately prayed that the call wasn't coming from inside the house. "You must be in Llanview."

"Oh, you're no fun," Kelly complained. "Couldn't you guess London?"

"Why would you ask me to guess where you are when you're in the exact place you were the last time I talked to you?" Blair asked. She wondered what it was like to be Kelly. What would it be like to live a life so careless and free of anything resembling strife? Kelly sailed through the world as the living embodiment of 'ignorance is bliss' and Blair couldn't imagine it. What was life like when you only had a passing acquaintance with your own brain?

"Well, I am back in Llanview. How surprised are you?"

"Mildly," Blair suggested. "I wasn't expecting you back this soon but I figured you and Joey would be visiting again later this year for the holidays." She paused. "Things are still okay with you and Joey, right?"

"Of course they are," Kelly's tone was a bit sharper. "Zane is back in school and Joey really wanted to come back and spend some more time with his father. We're at the Buchanan estate holding down the fort while Clint is at Llanfair. There is way more room at the Buchanan's anyway. Llanfair is more full than I've ever known it to be... Viki, Tina, Cord, Clint, Jess and Brody and their kids, Natalie and her kid. Todd is living there, too. And then the carriage house is still occupied by Rex and Gigi and Shane. Although," Kelly's voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper, "I hear that living arrangement might be changing soon."

If Rex and Gigi and Shane were moving next door to Dorian's, Blair would give a damn. Otherwise, she prefered to not know anything about the Balsom's. She had even stopped going to the diner altogether to avoid them. She'd banned Jack from going there, too, and in all honesty he didn't seem that bothered. The Buenos Dias Cafe had fallen out of favor with the high school crowd. A retro diner styled like a 1950s malt shoppe was the current hangout.

Blair had given Jack leave to go there after school twice a week based on how he was doing and the reports she got from teachers at school. Because Shane's mother worked at the Buenos Dias, Shane went there after school and Jack had no run ins with him. Since Todd's return and the revelations about Victor, Jack's time with Victor had been curtailed and there had been a noticeable difference in how he dealt with things. Jack didn't seem interested in anything regarding Shane Morasco and Blair remained thankful yet watchful.

"The Balsom-Morasco's are moving?" Blair feigned interest for Kelly's sake. If she could slake Kelly's thirst for gossip on the phone then she might not want to come over and do it in person. Blair just didn't want to deal with her cousin right now.

"Well, there's talk of shifting living arrangements around," Kelly replied. "Rex and Gigi both earn a living and can find a place of their own. They've been living rent free for a few years now and, well, Jessica and Natalie aren't exactly getting along and with the stress of the babies... it's all taking its toll."

"And that's why you and Joey are staying at the Buchanan place."

"Well, no one else is using at the moment. And since we plan on having Zane come here for the holidays it just makes more sense to move into a place with more room."

Blair was just happy Kelly hadn't brought Joey to La Boulie to take up residence. "Well, you're right about that. And you're finally bringing Zane to the States?"

"I think he'll enjoy it," Kelly said airily.

The doorbell rang and Blair crossed the foyer to get it. Todd was at the door beaming a smile so bright it nearly blinded her. She held up a finger to quiet him before he said anything but waved him in as she listened to Kelly prattle on about Zane's school and how well he was doing and how happy she and Joey were.

"That's great, Kel," Blair rolled her eyes at Todd who smirked in response. "Listen, I've got to go but, you know, this weekend is supposed to be really warm. Why don't you and Joey come on over here and we'll have the last family pool party of the year?"

Todd's eyebrows shot up as he considered what a pool party might mean for him. Very likely it would be his only chance at getting a glimpse of Blair in a bathing suit before autumn set in. He hoped she still wore bikinis.

"Okay, well, I'll call you tomorrow with some more details. Right. Okay then. Yes. Uh-huh. Bye bye now." Blair clicked the phone off and shot a long-suffering look at Todd. "Kelly's back in town."

"And still with Joey, I gather," Todd remarked. "Do you think it's still together or did she bounce between him and Kevin during the three weeks they were in London?"

"Oh, who could even guess?" Blair threw up her hands and headed into the living room.

"I have a surprise for you," Todd followed her.

Blair turned to give him an appraising look. His grin was huge and he looked entirely too pleased with himself. "What?" She asked warily.

He pulled out his wallet and gave her a small piece of plastic.

Blair took it, not breaking eye-contact with him and then focused on the card. Her suspicious expression shifted to a much kinder one. "Why, this looks like an official identification card with your picture and the name Todd Manning on it!" She looked up at him. "Does this mean what I think it means?"

"If you think it means I'm Todd Manning in the eyes of the law, then yes it does."

She smirked. "Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

He snatched the card back. "I don't have any outstanding warrants." He tossed her a mock expression of worry. "Do I?"

"I think you're safe..." she laughed. "For how long is up to you." She took a moment, just smiling at him, then stepped forward and hugged him. "Congratulations."

Todd closed his eyes when her arms went around him. He embraced her in return squeezing her tight against him until she squirmed and pulled back. He let her go, wondering if this was what it was like for her when they were married before and he was less than demonstrative with the physical affection. He remembered the way she would smile the few times he would initiate contact and how she was always reaching out to him, touching him... Blair was such a tactile creature and he was a stubborn idiot.

"So," she covered up the awkward moment quickly. "What is the Official Todd Manning going to do first?"

"Well, I already went to The Sun and laid down the law there."

"Of course."

"Maybe you can help me with something there, too."

Blair's eyebrows rose slightly in surprise. "What?"

"Can you tell me how the hell Kelly wound up having a job at my paper?"

"Well, gosh, Todd," Blair's eyes lit up. "It's a beautiful story about a local girl making good and the newspaper magnate who saw the potential in her plucky little blog!"

He gave her a stoic look. "Seriously?"

Blair shrugged. "When Kelly had her baby she started writing a blog about raising him. And she called it 'Raising Zane.' Apparently, it got some attention. When she came back to Llanview, Victor got all hot to get her on board with him at The Sun."

"Because of a Mommy Blog?" Todd's disbelief was clear. "Look, I'm not even suggesting that a Mommy Blog is a bad thing or that Kelly's wasn't good but... look at this!" He thrust the contract at Blair. "It sure as hell didn't deserve a contract like that!"

Blair cast a glance over the contract. "He really wanted her, Todd, I don't know what to tell you. Tea had just left him because apparently she couldn't be Dani's mother and his lover at the same time. He tried to get me into the sack about five seconds after Tea left him and when I turned him down I suppose he decided that Kelly was the next best thing." She handed the folder back to him. "The two of them certainly got their kicks annoying me with their new found partnership... It did get Kelly to sign on with Victor but then I decided to let them be idiots together and moved into a real relationship with Eli."

The way her lips tightened, Todd knew that Eli wasn't exactly a good subject.

She laughed weakly. "Guess I got the raw part of that deal in the end."

The shadow behind her eyes really unnerved him. "You really cared about this Eli guy, didn't you?"

Her entire body stiffened. "He was a murderer. Several times over."

"That's not what I asked."

"I'm not talking about this, Todd," Blair said. "I was in a good mood, okay? Those days don't come along very often and I'm not going to screw it up by talking about Eli."

The walls were up thicker than ever and Todd sighed heavily. "Okay, well, forget about Eli whatever. I'm dumping your cousin from my paper."

"Because of her Mommy blog?"

"I went over the work she's done for The Sun and, really, I'm being extremely kind referring to it as 'work' at all." Todd shook his head. "She isn't worth a quarter of what Victor paid her."

"Well, since Victor is no longer able to pretend to be you, you can just cancel her contract," Blair pointed out. "Her deal was with Todd Manning, which is you, and you didn't make that deal with her. Hell, I was there when she signed the paper so I can attest to the fact that the man she made her agreement with was definitely not you."

"Not to mention that there has been no resignation from her and she didn't get vacation time okayed when she took off to London with her most recent Buchanan acquisition. And, you know," he eyed the contract critically, "there's nothing in here that says she can just get away with that sort of shit."

Blair's good mood returned. "So, how are you going to do this?" She rubbed her hands together in wicked delight.

Todd loved to see his lady get goosebumps over the misery of others. She had schadenfreude raised to an art form. "Guess I'm going to have to pay a visit to Buchanan Acres."

"I wish I could see it," Blair sighed. "But that would look a bit too much like overkill. Just remember all the gory details so you can tell me about it."

He nodded in agreement, enjoying the image of his Blair revelling in the misery of others even if it was just for a moment. Then he cocked his head. "So about this pool party..."

Her eyes went wide then narrowed in suspicion. "What about it?"

"Can I come?"

"_You_ want to come to a pool party?"

"Yeah," he shrugged. "I can swim."

"Can you?" Blair asked. "Because I've never seen it. We got married on the beach and you didn't go swimming."

"I was wearing the only thing resembling a suit that I owned," he reminded her.

"I went swimming back at the hotel and you went looking for fruit drinks."

Would it be coming on too strong if he admitted that the suit and jacket he wore was meant to hide the arousal he had been trying to control regarding his new bride? Probably. Blair was hard to gauge these days and he was doing his best to tread lightly. "You said you were thirsty."

Blair put her hands on her hips and leveled an accusatory glare at him. "Do you even _own_ a swimsuit?"

"I've got my money again, I think I can afford it." He grinned. "So if I get one can I come?"

Her cheeks pinked suddenly as the image of Todd pulling himself out of the pool came unbidden to her mind. She lifted her chin and tossed her head. "If you've got the nerve to finally put on a bathing suit, yeah, you can come."

Todd watched her carefully. There was something very familiar about the way she was acting. It hit him like a thunderbolt. The slight flush, the sudden burst of 'I don't care, whatever' bravado, with the head toss... she was thinking lewd thoughts about him! He remembered seeing that a lot over the years when they were at odds and refusing to admit how much they wanted each other.

He did his best to remain cool. "Great," he held up the folder with Kelly's contract. "I've got to go fire your cousin. Do you mind if I come by later to see the kids?"

"Starr will be thrilled to know that your identity has been settled," Blair nodded. "Sam and Hope will be happy to see you. Jack will probably not be so enthused at today's events."

Todd shrugged. "One step at a time with that one."

"Well," Blair agreed. "At least now that it's been settled in court, we can hopefully move forward and try to get you two to have an actual relationship. When he gets home from school, I'll talk to him about what happened... I think it's better that he doesn't get blind-sided by it all."

"Okay, well, I'll see you later then," he hesitated for a moment and then leaned forward to kiss her on the cheek.

She watched him leave and as the door shut she fell back onto the chair with a groan. "Stay strong, Blair," she told herself. "Todd and I can be parents together and we can do it well. This 'courtship' thing is... well, he'll get tired of that soon enough. It's just better this way. No love. No love. No love."

* * *

The Buchanan mansion was exactly how he remembered it. Todd actually felt some relief over that one. So much had changed in Llanview that it was nice to see that some things hadn't. He leaned on the doorbell until a harried Joey finally answered the door.

He blinked. "Todd."

"Hey."

They stared at each other for a moment.

"What are you doing here?" Joey asked.

"I came to see Kelly," Todd replied. "Can I come in?"

"Sure," Joey stepped back, a puzzled expression on his face and called Kelly into the foyer.

Kelly bounced in but stopped short when she saw Todd. "Holy crap, it's true." She took a few steps towards him, staring with wide eyes. "It's the old you."

"There's no old me or new me," he told her. "There's just me. The real me. As opposed to the fake me, which brings me to my visit." He held up the folder. "I don't know what the hell Victor was thinking but you are no longer an employee of The Sun. Our business relationship is hereby dissolved."

Kelly narrowed her eyes. "So I assume you brought the extremely generous severance check with you?"

Todd barked a laugh. "No. The contract you made with Victor is null and void. It's a fraudulent contract, I never would have hired you to work for me much less paid you the ridiculous amount of money he was paying you to do absolutely nothing."

"Hey, I ran that paper when he was shot," Kelly pointed out. "And I did a damn good job of it!"

"Even if I did believe you," Todd shrugged. "Which I don't, whether or not you ran my paper well is irrelevant. You signed a fraudulent contract which I have no interest in continuing so that's that. Not to mention that you took off with Buchanan Number One here," he nodded at Joey, "and you didn't bother to notify HR about it. You've been gone from your post for a month. That's called job abandonment and no court would support you."

Kelly scowled. "I've got to say it, I liked the other Todd better."

"Of course you did," Todd replied. "He's as big an idiot as you are."

"Watch it, Manning," Joey stepped forward.

"Oh, take it easy, Galahad," Todd rolled his eyes. "I've been locked up and tortured for eight years. You're not even close to being intimidating." He shifted his gaze back to Kelly. "Now, that that's all settled, what can you tell me about Eli Clarke?"

Kelly looked stunned for a moment. "Why would you want to know about _him_?"

"Because whoever he was and whatever he did hurt Blair in a big way and I need to know about it."

"Eli's dead," Kelly snapped. "What does it matter?"

"He hurt Blair!" Todd yelled causing Kelly to jump. "That's why it matters. And whatever he did to her is still there... it's still in her and I just want to know what the hell happened!"

"Blair's fine," Kelly insisted. "She said as much when she got back from Tahiti after marrying and then shooting him. I asked her what I could do to help and she told me that I should just tell everyone that she was back and she was fine."

Todd shook his head. "Are you really that god-damned stupid?"

"She _said_..."

"Blair always says she's fine!" Todd burst out. "_Always_! Because she doesn't want people to see how much she's really hurt! Did you even _try_ talking to her about it?"

Kelly stalked into the living room and dropped herself onto the couch. "If you're going to berate me, I'm damn well going to be comfortable." Joey sat down next to her and patted her leg.

"Just tell me about this guy," Todd said, sitting down opposite the two of them.

"Eli was perfect," Kelly shrugged. "Tall, dark and handsome, a successful lawyer, charming and likeable. _Everyone_ in town liked him. He was good to her, he cooked for her, their sex life could be heard miles away, he managed to disengage her from fights with people like me and Tod- uh, other Todd... Victor, I guess, and he showered attention and affection on her. Elijah Clarke was _perfect_. The only problem was that his _real_ name was Bennet Thompson and he had a dark history that involved killing the women he married for his money. Not to mention killing people he thought might get in the way of that. He killed my mother, after all."

"Is that what he had planned for Blair?" Todd asked. "He was going to kill her, too?"

Kelly looked uncertain. "I don't know," she finally said. "It's possible that he actually did fall in love with her. Blair thought she had killed him after their wedding but when he came back into town he wanted to take Blair and disappear with her... raise a family together..."

Todd looked ill.

"She gave herself up to him because she thought he was holding Starr hostage but then she snuck back into the warehouse and found Tea. Everyone thought Tea was dead but Blair found her and freed her and she's the one who reunited Tea with Todd... other Todd... I mean..."

"Victor," Todd supplied.

"She believed that you really loved Tea," Kelly explained.

It was strange to think about. Blair believed that he loved Tea and so she did everything she could to support it. That's who Blair was, though. She'd do anything to help the people she cared about be happy. Her heart was as big as Viki's was and she got absolutely no credit for it. "So... when did everyone clue into the fact that he was bad news?"

"Not until right before she ran off to marry him." Kelly sighed. "I tried to stop her but she didn't believe me."

"Does that surprise you?"

"I _am_ her cousin," Kelly insisted. "I don't want anything bad to happen to Blair."

"Except when you don't want anything _good_ to happen to her, either." Todd sneered. "Don't even try, bubblehead. I've been around. I know that shit you've done to her, I know the crap you've pulled and don't think I have _ever_ forgotten that you left her dying on the side of the road. Don't think I ever will."

Kelly's face paled and she choked out a response. "As if you're any better."

"The things I've done do _not_ absolve you of the things you've done," Todd stood up. "And it's really pathetic when people try to throw me under the bus to make themselves feel better about the crap they've done to Blair. Nothing I've done will ever make up for the things you did. She is your _family_ and you _left_ her there. She _never_ would have done that to you." He threw a disgusted look at her and left.

* * *

Jack put a finger to his lips and peeked around the hedge to see if the back patio was clear. The girl with him remained dutifully silent as he scanned the area and then motioned for her to follow him. Together, they crept along the hedgerow to the cabana door and Jack swiftly ushered her inside.

The moment he had the door closed, she clasped her hands together and smiled at him gratefully. "Thank you so much for helping me. If my brother had found me..."

"Yeah, he would have sent you back to India and you would have been sold into marriage," Jack sat down on a nearby chair. "Why don't you tell me the truth now?"

The girl, Neela by name, blinked at him and then dropped her hands with a shrug. "All right. I exaggerated a little bit. But, you have to understand, my life has already been decided for me by my parents and if I go back I might never have the opportunity to make my own choices."

"Everybody feels like that sometimes," Jack replied. "But, look, you can stay here for a little bit. It's safe and I'll sneak some food out to you in a little bit. At least this way you can let your family know that you mean business."

"Thank you so much, Jack," she smiled shyly at him. "I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't helped me."

It was almost alien for someone to look at him like he was a hero and Jack felt himself taken aback by the mere concept. After a moment, he decided he quite liked the way this girl with the big brown eyes and bright smiled looked at him. He wasn't a bully to her. He was anything but.

It felt great.

"I was glad to help," and he meant it. "I have to get inside, though. My Mom's going to be looking for me. I'm sorry there's not more to do out here but... maybe I can find some books for you when I bring you something to eat."

"Jack, you've already done so much."

"It's okay, really," he smiled and she smiled back. "I'll be back as soon as I can."

When Jack went into the house, he made a beeline for the refrigerator to take stock of what he could bring out to Neela. Blair came in to find him foraging. "There's my boy," she smiled. "How was school?"

Jack shrugged, closing the door. "Got an A on my chemistry test."

Blair's smile widened. "I love that my kids are so good at science. You know, I was pretty good at science in school, too."

"Really?"

"Not as good as you and Starr but I liked how everything made sense. It was one of the few places where things made sense all the time. If you put this together with this it always meant that. My life, at the time, made very little sense." Her smile faded somewhat. "Listen, Jack, I need to talk to you."

The tone of his mother's voice made him straighten up suspiciously. Had she seen him sneaking Neela into the cabana? He had been pretty sure the coast was clear at the time but his mother was proving to be extremely observant where he was involved these days. "Why?"

"The identity case has been settled," Blair explained gently. "It's been determined that Victor is Victor and Todd is Todd. Todd has his identity back as well as his paper and his money. They decided that earlier today."

"So Scarface just took everything away from Dad?"

"No," Blair said firmly. "Todd got what belongs to him back from Victor."

"Which leaves Dad with nothing!"

"He doesn't have nothing," Blair replied patiently. "He has, probably, the most important thing he could have."

"Which is what?"

"The chance to have his own life back," Blair watched her son carefully, studying his reaction.

"Dad _has_ a life," Jack burst out. "He's had it for years and now Scarface is stealing it from him!"

"It's _Todd's_ life," Blair's words were clipped. "Todd's life. Victor had it for awhile, yes, but Todd had it before him. Todd had you and Starr long before Victor. Todd had The Sun. Todd _built_ The Sun. He created that paper from nothing before you and Starr were ever born! The only life Victor had stolen from him is the one his mother took when she replaced his life with Todd's for her own insane reasons!"

"None of this is fair! I want to see Dad!"

"Not right now." Blair shook her head. "Victor and Tea have a lot to do to figure out what they're are going to do with their lives. I am not going to keep you from your Uncle but, right now, I have to consider what is best for you, for Sam, and even for him. You will be staying here for the time being."

"Mom!"

She held up her hand. "I have every intention of taking all of you kids over to Victor's and letting you have some time with him. He will always be your Uncle but he is not your father and, frankly, the last several years of him being your father haven't been particularly good for you or your brother and sister."

"You can't tell me to stop loving him."

"I didn't tell you to stop loving him and I won't tell you to do that."

Jack found that it was very difficult to argue with his mother when she was like this. She was being logical and understanding and firm and, at that moment, he really missed when she was easier to accuse of being... anything he wanted really. After he'd been caught trying to lure Shane Morasco into that abandoned house she had stopped letting him manipulate her emotionally. She had turned into a sentinel and she didn't care if she came off 'unreasonable' or 'mean' or anything and she was being that way now. "So... what do you expect me to do?"

Blair studied her son for a moment. "Todd is going to be coming over tonight to share the news with you and your sister and brother. He's going to be spending time with all of you. He's missed out on years of your lives and it's time you all start rebuilding a relationship with him. I told you about what happened today because I knew that you would take it the hardest and I didn't want you to be surprised." She reached forward to touch his face but he ducked away from her. "Jack, I love you and I'm here for you in all of this. I'm not going anywhere. Now get your homework."

Jack went to get his backpack stewing inside at the unfairness of it all. Scarface was not going to have it this easy. He'd make sure of that.


	15. Chapter 15

Viki's house was filled with people, some he liked but most he didn't. Todd found himself increasingly irritated by the constant dull roar of everyone milling about. At Dorian's, it was all people he loved so the noise was welcoming.

Hope and Sam chattered and played. Jack and Starr tossed teasing remarks back and forth. Blair oversaw it all and Todd just wanted to be accepted by everyone. Starr had already welcomed him back with open arms. Jack was going to be a tougher sell. Sam was also accepting and friendly while Hope remained a little shy. She was warming up to him, though, and even let him read a book to her before bedtime.

Once it was time for Sam's bedtime, Starr approached her father and asked if he wanted to take a walk with her. Todd nodded looking forward to a little alone time with his firstborn now that his identity was fully established. They had a lot to talk about.

The night was crisp as they set out and for a moment they walked in silence. Todd noticed that the trees on the avenue were thicker than he remembered. In eight years, they'd matured and deepened and an already older, established neighborhood was beginning to look threatened by the trees around them.

"So, how's it feel to be Todd Manning again?"

"I never stopped, Starr."

She chuckled lightly in the darkness. "I suppose that's true. Still, must be nice to have it all official, right?"

"It was a big hurdle," he agreed. "But there's still some obstacles."

"Such as?"

"Well, a place to live, for one..." Todd mused. "Did you know my penthouse got bought and combined with another penthouse to make one giant penthouse that some doctor and his trophy wife live in?"

"I didn't actually."

"I really loved that penthouse."

"I know. That's what Mom always said too."

"That she loved it?"

"That _you_ loved it."

"Oh," Todd was quiet. "I think she actually stopped loving it years ago. It was _our_ place, you know? And then I turned it into Delgado's place and I don't think your mom has loved it since then."

"Mom doesn't love places, not really."

Todd shook his head. "She loved the penthouse, Starr. It was before your time but she loved it. I'm the one who changed it into something that wasn't hers anymore. She doesn't love Dorian's because... again, it's someone else's place. Your mother doesn't like French decor. She's not rococo or baroque or La Belle Epoque or the rest of whatever Dorian's obsessed with. Your mother likes modern minimal design. If that weren't Dorian's house, she wouldn't live there and it wouldn't look like that."

Starr was silent for a moment. "You're not really thinking about the house, are you?"

"Why do you say that?"

"Because you aren't. This is all about Mom, isn't it?"

"Maybe."

"What's the problem?"

"That's kind of what I'm trying to figure out," Todd sighed. "I've talked to Viki about some things... I even talked to Kelly... maybe I should talk to you. You've been here the whole time and you actually _do_ love your mother."

"Kelly loves Mom," Starr's response was weak even to her ears. "I mean... if you asked her, she'd say she loves Mom. And she probably really believes that she does."

Todd scoffed at that. "She's an idiot. It was one thing when she was a teenager but the rest of her grew up and her mind didn't. She's still an idiot who just breezes through everything without any thought to anyone else." He shook his head. "I really don't want to waste my time on that ditz. Tell me about your mother."

"What about her?"

"Like, what she went through while I was gone."

"She got her heart broken about a thousand times. I treated her like crap, Victor treated her like crap, Jack treats her like crap now. She almost died a few times... she got locked up in a mental institution by Asa, she was almost raped..."

"What the hell?!"

Starr glanced at her father, who had abruptly stopped walking and just stared at her in the growing darkness.

"Who tried to rape her?" Todd's voice was a tone Starr had never heard before in her life. It actually sent shivers up her spine.

"Dad..."

"_Who_?"

"He's dead."

"_WHO_?!"

"Spencer Truman," Starr turned away from Todd and looked down the slope of the street towards Llanview. She remembered the harrowing scene all too well. Her mother, unconscious in a hospital bed, wearing a wedding dress with blood splattered all over her. It looked like some scene out of a horror movie. Her mother had just managed to fight off a heart infection that almost killed her only to wind up in the clutches of the psychotic doctor who had been so obsessed with her that he blithely destroyed all of their lives.

"What is it about Mom?" Starr wondered aloud.

"What?"

"Mom seems to inspire obsession," Starr continued. "Whether it's fueled by love or hate... what is it about her that makes people react to her that way? Spencer, Victor, Eli, Kevin, Max, Asa, Tomas, you... it's like no one can feel lukewarm about her. It's always extreme."

Todd preferred to get back to the matter of Spencer Truman trying to rape his woman but Starr's voice held him back. There was a strange, wondering tone to it. "You mean you've never wondered about it before right this moment?" He grinned. "You just listed eight guys and it's only _now_ that you're going 'Gee, wonder what it is about Mom?'"

Starr huffed slightly. "I never really thought about it."

"That doesn't sound like you."

"It was always... _normal_," Starr shrugged. "You were always obsessed with her so it seemed natural that everyone else would be, too."

"I love your mother, Starr. I'm not obsessed."

"You don't love her like real normal people."

"Your mother's not normal and neither am I."

"Yeah, _that_ I've heard before."

"Because it's true." Todd's eyes moved from Llanview's lights to the stars above. "Your mother is the most amazing woman in the world. There is no one like her at all. People respond to that, they can't help themselves. Not everyone _appreciates_ her and so they try to tear her down or destroy her... but the thing about your mom... she's invincible. No one can tear her down.

"Why do people become obsessed with her? Well, what would anyone do to be near someone like her? She's the reason I _know_ fairy tales are true because she is the woman I would do anything for... climb mountains made of glass, slay monsters, defy the very gods to kiss her fingertips."

Starr laughed softly. "You are _so_ in love with her..."

"Well, yeah..." Todd felt a little embarrassed. He wasn't particularly comfortable wearing his heart on his sleeve for Blair in front of their daughter. It felt kind of weird. Still, it felt equally good to say it all out loud.

"So what are you going to do about it?"

Todd smiled into the night. "Don't worry about me, Starr."

"I worry, Dad" Starr replied. "I worry because I've seen Mom get hurt so many times and I don't want to see it happen again. _Especially_ with you... you've done more than your share of damage and if you can't figure out a way to love Mom without destroying her life than figure out a way to let her go."

"True love is not an easy road, Starr," Todd told his daughter. "Have some faith."

"Oh brother..."

"Now, tell me about this Spencer Truman."

* * *

Blair opened a bottle of Petit Verdot and let it breathe. She got two glasses out and headed into the living room with them. She assumed Todd would find a way to stay a little longer so she decided not to fight it too much. Besides, hesitancy about what he wanted from her or not, she was actually glad to have him around. After years of problems, there was a strange gentleness to Todd since his return. It left her with a disquieting sensation as she continued to wait for the other shoe to drop but, at the same time, he was the closest he'd been in years to the first real friend she'd had who played Most Pathetic with her and made her feel good.

She pinched the bridge of her nose. "Oh what am I doing?"

There was no point in fighting it. Todd was, as had been mentioned before, a fact of her life. All that remained to be seen was what sort of fact he was going to be. If he was going to be in her life, she'd do well to figure that part of it out.

The front door opened as she started to head back into the kitchen and Todd and Starr entered, their cheeks reddened slightly at the cooling night air. A startling flush of anger powered through Blair's veins as she took them in. Too many instances of Starr and Todd or Starr and Victor in cahoots against her... manipulating her... leaving her to play the bad cop rushed through her mind and she wondered if they were already plotting together and if she were the subject of said plots.

"Is everyone in bed?" Starr asked as she shed her coat.

"Pretty much," Blair nodded. Jack was probably reading after his rather bizarre after dinner activities. She was keeping an eye on him but wasn't going to jump to the worst conclusions.

"Well, in that case, I'm going to go upstairs, too," Starr said. "I've got some studying to do and I want to check in on Hope too. Night," she tip-toed a kiss on Todd's cheek and then stepped forward and hugged her mother fiercely.

Blair watched Starr go up the stairs wondering what that hug was about. Starr didn't normally hug her good-night so intensely. Her suspicions about what Todd and their daughter were up to increased. She cast a glance at him to find him studying her. He noticed and shifted his weight from foot to foot moving his gaze to the ceiling.

"I was just about to have a glass of wine," Blair told him with a shrug. "You're welcome to join me."

"Really?"

"I figured you'd come up with an excuse to stick around anyway. Thought I'd make it easy on you."

He grinned at that. "Sure," he nodded, peeling off his own coat and following her into the kitchen where he tossed it over one of the barstools.

She grabbed the bottle and went back into the living room to pour the glasses. "Did you have a nice walk with Starr?"

"Sometimes it's the little things in life you treasure," Todd mused. "For eight years I not only was deprived my daughter and my son but I couldn't even go on a walk. What a strange existence; to be grateful for the chance to go for a walk."

"What about wind sprints?"

Todd grinned. "Let's not go crazy." He watched her as she peered out the French doors into the night. "Are you looking for something?"

"Just thinking," Blair didn't turn from the doors. "Jack's up to something. He snuck out earlier with a lot of food and some extra blankets towards the cabana. He didn't think I saw him. He stayed out there for about twenty minutes before coming back inside."

"What do you think it is."

"I don't know, maybe he's hiding a dog in there. I'll give it a day or two before I push."

"And if it is a dog?"

Blair shrugged. "Maybe it would be good for him. Starr had all sorts of pets when she was growing up and Jack hasn't. Maybe it would be good for him to have something to take care of. It's worth thinking about."

Todd nodded, admiring the view of Blair's curvaceous behind as she looked outside. He'd dreamt of that ass for years and now here he was looking right at it. He wondered what Blair would do if he got up and smacked her right on it. The thought amused him as he took a sip of wine and let it swirl around his tongue before swallowing.

"Do you remember Shawna?"

Blair turned to look at him, an expression of mild puzzlement on her face. "The name sounds vaguely familiar." The crease between her brow appeared as she tried to remember why.

Todd grinned. "She was my intern at the paper," he prodded her memory. "After I got back from the island."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh. That one. The walking sex toy. Why on earth would you bring her up?"

Todd chuckled at Blair's commentary. He also found her complete dismissal of the girl endearing. Shawna hadn't been any kind of competition for Blair but, at the time, her existence rankled his woman to the point where she was picking fights. It was something that gave him hope that they could be together at the time. If she hadn't cared, she wouldn't have been so upset. "I'm sitting here, drinking a glass of wine and suddenly her attempts at flirting come into my head."

"Do I even want to hear this?"

"I think you'll get a kick out of it." He took another sip of wine. "So I poured the wine and she takes a sip and starts cooing about how much she loves good wine because it tastes like sex."

The Blairian eyeroll was one for the record books. "She actually said that?"

"She did."

Blair sat down on the couch next to him. She studied him quietly for several moments.

"What?"

"I'm just trying to figure out what it says about you that you wanted to sleep with her."

"I _didn't_ want to sleep with her."

"You sure about that?"

Todd tilted his head and gave her an 'oh please' look. "There was nothing that girl had that interested me. Her use was solely in pushing your buttons."

"Well, you talked a good game at the time."

"You were supposed to believe that I wanted to do her," Todd pointed out. "That was the scam."

Blair shook her head and took a sip of wine. As she swallowed, her lips turned up into a teasing smile. "This tastes like sex," she breathed in mockery of the obvious girl from a decade ago.

"You should have seen Viki's face," Todd grinned.

"Viki was there?" Blair's eyes widened. "She said that in front of Viki?!"

Todd nodded.

"Oh my God," Blair laughed. She imagined the scene as Todd laid it out and was overwhelmed by hysterical laughter. Todd, remembering the scene and acting out Viki's response for Blair's pleasure, gave into the laughter as well. How long had it been since he had honestly laughed? How long had it been for Blair? Did it matter? Here they were, after all these years, laughing together.

She was one of the few people in the world that honestly made him laugh and smile. In the back of his mind, he considered what Starr had told him about Spencer Truman but he let it remain in the shadows for now. He didn't want to bring up anything that would ruin the moment.

Blair wiped the tears of laughter from her eyes as she got herself under control. "So, tell me," she said, her voice still light with humor. "What are you going to do now that you've got your millions back?"

"Well, the extent of that is still in question," Todd's expression darkened a bit. His brother and his greedy ex-wife weren't about to let him have his money without a fight. But he was equally determined to fight back even harder. "But I really have to do something with my hair."

A smile quirked the corners of Blair's mouth as she looked up at his crowning glory. Jack had scathingly referred to it as a 'Bieber 'do' but Blair thought her son's own mop of 70's inspired unruliness didn't leave him much room to talk. Besides, to her, it was a throwback to the 60s Carnaby Street mod look inspired by The Beatles. "Like what?"

"Highlights, I'm thinking," Todd shrugged. "I just need to make it look different than it did when I was incarcerated. Like, I'm out in the sun again."

She reached forward and brushed her fingers through his hair, fluffing it across his forehead. "Well, if you want I can give you my stylist. I'm sure if I make the call he'll fit you in tomorrow."

"Does he have a crush on you?"

"It's more likely he'd have a crush on you," Blair tossed back. "It's a little cliche, I suppose, but Bastian knows his stuff. I wouldn't trust my hair to anyone else. Do you want me to call him?"

"Sure," Todd wondered if this Bastian was a cliched hairstyling gossip, too. If so, he might be able to drag some more information about Blair out of him. "You know, coming back from the dead was a lot easier."

"That's because I kept all of your stuff," Blair reminded him. "I couldn't bring myself to throw any of it away so you still had all of your clothes. Speaking of which..."

"Yeah, that's something else I'll be doing tomorrow," Todd played with the buttons on his shirt. "Getting clothes that Viki didn't run out and buy for me. I'm grateful she didn't come back with any cowboy clothes, we all know she's got a fondness for those."

Blair nodded. "It'll be nice to see you in Todd clothes again."

He shrugged. "I don't know that they're so much 'Todd clothes' since whenever I'm buying stuff I think 'what would Blair like to see me in?' You always had the style, babe."

"Well, the raw materials were easy to work with," she smiled gently at him. "I'm guessing you're going to want to find a new penthouse or something, too."

Todd sipped his wine thoughtfully. He actually had no intention of house hunting unless Blair was with him and they were looking for a place together for them and their kids. Hopefully, he'd be able to pry her out of Dorian's French nightmare when the time came. He'd absolutely be willing to spring for a place with a pool if it meant they could get out from under Dorian's thumb and not have to worry about her walking in. He was actually pretty happy that Dorian was out of the state and not likely to return any time soon.

Unless she got embroiled in some scandal in Washington. Then again, she somehow got the job with the extraordinarily checkered past that was public knowledge in the first place.

"The living situation is more complicated," he said carefully. "I've really got to think about what I want."

"I know what you mean," Blair sighed. "I've got a project on that score in the works, too."

"Really?"

Blair shrugged. "Maybe I'll tell you about it sometime."

"You can tell me now," Todd prodded.

"I'm not ready."

"Aw, Blair... what are you doing to me? You know I'm no good at waiting."

"Eight years didn't teach you patience?"

He grinned in spite of himself. "Patience in some things... even less patience in others."

She just shook her head at him. "When I'm ready to share, I'll share."

"All right then, have your little secret." He finished his wine. "And call your guy tomorrow so I can do something about this." He brushed his hand over his hair, then shook it with a mock vain-glorious expression on his face.

Blair giggled. "I will."

"Okay, well... I should probably head back to Viki's half-way house."

"How are things going over there?"

He shrugged as he went to get his coat. Blair followed him to listen. "It's a lot of Buchanan blood flowing through Llanfair."

"There's been Buchanans flowing through Llanfair as long as we've both been around," Blair reminded him. "It's just that you're staying there now."

"Yeah, I know," he sighed. "At least Viki doesn't try to make me sit down to dinner with all of them. I'd probably wind up throwing a knife at someone."

Blair laughed. "Oh, the crosses you bear."

He paused at the front door to look at her. "This was nice," he said. "It feels good to have something to celebrate."

"It do-" Blair's agreement was cut off as Todd swooped in, pulling her against him with his arm around her waist. He pressed his cheek against hers and kissed her earlobe softly. "-does..." Her eyes closed and her hands rested against his chest as he held her. His breath tickled her ear and he felt one of his hands stroking her hair softly.

After a moment, he slowly pulled away. "Night," he whispered, before opening the door and disappearing into the darkness.

Blair closed the door behind him and checked all the locks noting that there were goosebumps on her arms. _What that man does to me._


	16. Chapter 16

The fire extinguisher fell to the floor with a loud clatter as Neela flung herself into Jack's arms, hugging him tightly. "Jack, you saved us!"

Neela's brother Vimal looked like he was about to step forward and peel his sister off the younger man but his wife, Rama, held him back with a shush.

"It was very lucky you came along, Jack," Rama said. Her smile was friendly but not overly so. "Your father might want to check the locks on the door in case something dreadful like this happens again."

"Yes, ma'am," Jack replied miserably. His great plan to slap back at his unwanted biological father had gone dreadfully wrong and he stood in the midst of a singed hallway with the acrid smell of burnt plastic and whatever the carpeting was made out coating the inside of his nostrils.

What a stupid plan this had been. He was never going to get off of probation if anyone figured out he had started this fire. He may as well kiss soccer goodbye come the spring. All of this was presuming his mother wouldn't chain him up in the basement for being an uncontrollable monster that couldn't be trusted around people.

Todd came rushing in at that point, eyes wide and panicky. "Is everyone okay?" He looked at Jack, then each of the Patel's in turn and then back to Jack.

"We're fine, Mr. Manning," Vimal stepped forward. "Jack was here and put the fire out and let us out as well. The lock on your door... is it supposed to shut down like that in case of emergency?"

Todd glanced at his door. "I'm not sure, this redesign was Victor's doing." He looked around the office taking in the damage. It didn't look too bad all things considered. There certainly wasn't enough damage to interrupt the workings of the paper although he did wonder where his staff was. The offices were completely empty save for Jack and the Patels. Vimal was the one who worked here so he didn't understand why he had his wife and... another girl around Jack's age there.

The other girl was gazing at Jack with doe eyes.

Jack seemed to be attempting to disappear into the carpet but still managed to cast a glance at the girl every now and again, turning pink around the ears and cheeks whenever he did so.

"Where is everybody?" Todd asked.

Vimal looked at him strangely. "I'm sorry, Mr. Manning?"

"Where is everybody?" Todd repeated.

"You gave everyone the day off," Vimal said. "We heard the announcement over the intercoms about fifteen minutes before the fire broke out."

"Of course," Todd said immediately. His eyes flickered back to his son, who seemed even more determined to disappear. "You know, I actually meant to do that tomorrow to give everyone a nice long weekend. My assistant must have mixed up the dates."

Vimal accepted that and reached forward to touch the young girl's shoulder. "Mr. Manning, I apologize for being rude. This is my sister Neela."

Todd nodded as Neela smiled and said hello to him in a tiny voice. "Are you sure everyone's okay? Maybe you should go to the hospital and get checked out. I'd hate to have any of you suffering from smoke inhalation or anything. There's a crew from the fire department here sweeping the office looking for any other problems. There's probably some paramedics with them so they'll check everyone out."

"Thank you, Mr. Manning," Vimal reached one arm out to gather Neela and ushered her towards the door.

Neela kept looking at Jack, waving goodbye to him as she was hustled out. Jack offered her a wave in return then dropped his head and kicked at the extinguisher half-heartedly.

Todd watched his son. Something had happened and if he knew Manning mentality, and he did, he'd be willing to bet that Jack was directly involved with the mysterious and destructive goings on at his office today. "School get out early?"

"Yeah," Jack muttered. "Half day for teacher work day or something."

"I should get you home," Todd remarked. "Your mother is going to be mighty impressed with your heroic efforts today."

Jack flushed guiltily. "We don't have to tell her do we?"

"My office was on fire," Todd replied. "That's news and your mother is going to hear it one way or the other. Might as well be from us. One thing about your Mom? She really hates being the last one to know something. Take it from me."

Todd was about to move towards his son to gather him up and towards the door when John McBain walked in.

"Seems we've had a little excitement here today, huh?"

Since his escape, John had actually been more of a help to Todd than he ever expected but right now... Todd was reminded that McBain was a cop. And cops were annoying and had very bad timing.

* * *

Jack sat in the back of the limo with Todd as they were driven back to La Boulie. He cast several sideways glances at his father trying to figure him out.

The intent had been to do so much damage to The Sun offices that Todd wouldn't be able to run the paper. It was supposed to have been a way of getting even with Todd for taking The Sun away from Victor. The Patels being in the office resulted in him having to put his own fire out and then Neela hailed him as a hero.

He liked that but he didn't deserve it. If he had left, they all could have been very badly hurt. Even killed. Another stupid, careless mistake driven by... stupid, stupid, stupid.

Todd watched his son silently berating himself. He should know what it looked like as he'd spent many an hour doing it to himself. "Jack, are you alright?"

"What do you care?"

"You're my son, Jack Manning," Todd reminded him. "You better believe I care. I care more than you will ever know."

Jack's face scrunched up and he hastily wiped his hand against his eyes before glaring at Todd again. "Whatever."

Todd shook his head, smiling to himself as the limo pulled up into the driveway of La Boulie. He saw so much of himself in Jack and he hoped he would be allowed to help Jack steer away from the same mistakes he had made when he was young. He never wanted his son to suffer the life he had made for himself and he wanted so much to talk to him and tell him how much he understood.

Jack didn't want to listen, though.

As they got out of the car Jack trotted ahead to open the door. Blair came into the foyer with a phone in her hand. "I just got a call that there was a fire at The Sun?" She looked at Jack and Todd with wide demanding eyes.

Jack shot a worried glance over his shoulder at Todd.

"Yep," Todd stepped forward, closing the door behind him. "Luckily no one was hurt thanks to Jack here."

Blair's eyes narrowed slightly as she looked at her son. "What were you doing at The Sun?"

"He was picking up some stuff he left when he worked there with Victor," Todd supplied, clapping his hand on Jack's shoulder and giving him a friendly shake. "Lucky thing, too, given what happened."

Blair looked at Todd and caught him giving her a heavily loaded 'Work with me here' stare. She turned back to her son. "Are you okay, Jack?"

"Yeah, I'm fine."

"Are you sure?" She stepped forward, grasping his arms to give him a serious once over. "Do we need to take you to the hospital or anything?"

"No!" Jack insisted. "I'm fine. I put out the fire with the extinguisher. I barely got close enough to even feel the heat. I'm fine."

Blair hugged him tightly. "As long as you're sure... but if I hear so much as a cough..."

Jack pulled away, ducking his head. "I'm going to go upstairs, okay?"

Blair let him go, chucking him under the chin as she did. Jack headed up the stairs and Blair and Todd stood side by side following the sounds of his footsteps with their eyes until they heard the sound of his door slamming.

"Yeah," Todd turned to Blair. "I think he started the fire."

She shook her head and went into the living room closing the doors as Todd followed her in. "Are you sure?"

"Pretty sure," he shrugged off his coat and tossed it on the couch. "He covered for himself pretty well when McBain showed up to ask questions but if he keeps digging he's going to clue in just like I did. Jack's wily but he's not a real planner. I think he did this on the fly out of anger."

"Well, he hasn't been all that pleased with your getting your identity back," Blair pinched the bridge of her nose. "I thought we had turned a corner, I really did. How am I going to get through to that boy? 'Oh, I'm mad... I think I'll set a building on fire with people in it!' Dammit!"

"To be fair," Todd pointed out. "He thought he sent everyone home before he set the fire."

The relief was evident over Blair's entire body. "Really?"

Todd nodded.

"That's good," Blair sighed. "That's good. That's good right? I mean, he thought about other people... he didn't want to hurt anyone and that's good. He just wanted to do property damage... which isn't good but it's a step in the right direction. Don't you think?"

Todd stepped forward and pulled Blair into his arms. He stroked her hair gently. "We'll get through this. Yeah, it's totally good that he didn't set out to hurt anyone this time. Whatever you've been doing with him since the stuff with that Morasco kid is working... it is."

"God, I hope so," Blair leaned her face into his neck instinctively. "He was my beautiful, sweet little boy and I don't know what happened... I don't know when it happened. I just don't know..."

"It's okay," Todd crooned. "It's okay. We'll manage. We'll fix it."

"How?" She pulled back to look at him.

Todd had to admit he was at a loss. "I don't know, babe, you were always much better at the actual parenting than I was."

"Yeah, I've done an amazing job," Blair turned away and sat down on the couch. "My daughter got pregnant at 16 and my son's a bully and a teenaged arsonist. I haven't exactly provided a stable environment for any of them."

"Don't beat yourself up, Blair," Todd sat down next to her. "Think of what we had to work with. You didn't have any kind of actual upbringing and I got the shit beat out of me on a regular basis for anything Peter felt like beating me for, real or imagined. Victor got the memories but none of the actual experience... when it comes down to it, a teenaged pregnancy and a bully issue is pretty normal.

"Given what people think of us, it's a triumph that neither of our kids was a serial killer before the age of ten."

Blair laughed in spite of herself.

"And remember, Jessica got pregnant when she was teenager," Todd reminded her. "And no one's going to say that Viki's a bad mother."

"Unfortunately, with Jessica's own DID..." Blair sobered. "That brings up a lot of other questions."

"The point," Todd continued, "is that everyone in this town expected the worst. I remember the way people acted when we got married and you were pregnant the first time. They felt sorry for our kid, like he was screwed up the second we had sex, and they were all pretty certain that we'd mess him up and turn him into a second Hitler or something."

Blair laughed again. "That's true. Like anyone has room to talk, right? Nora's somehow managed to raise two murderers." She laughed a little louder. "Somehow, I don't feel so bad. There's always hope for Jack. It's just frustrating because we used to be so close and now..."

"Now he's a teenaged boy," Todd supplied. "Speaking as a former teenaged boy, we're kind of awful."

"Well, I just have to keep doing what I've been doing," Blair nodded. "Loving him completely and making sure he's got rules to follow."

"He likes a girl," Todd piped up.

Blair blinked. "Really?"

"Yeah. Neela Patel, Vimal's sister. She was giving him the doe eyes at the office and he was really soaking it up."

"That's interesting."

"Has he had a girlfriend before?"

"There was a girl in the gang he used to hang out with," Blair recalled. "But I don't believe they were attached at all. Now that I think about it, that little gang was off on all sides. I haven't heard him mention any of them since the last round with the Morascos."

"That's good though, right?"

"Yes," Blair agreed. "I don't know this Neela girl, though."

"Well, Vimal and his wife are very protective of her from what I saw. She's a sweet little thing even if I only got a look at her for about five minutes."

"Guess I'll have to keep my eyes open, then," Blair remarked. "The right girl can make a huge difference to a troubled boy. I only hope that he doesn't get the idea that he can be a jerk and it's all okay simply because of the example I've set."

"Blair..."

She waved him off. "Hopefully, he'll come to me. We'll see."

Todd got the distinct feeling that Blair wasn't going to continue the conversation in regards to her. "Okay, well, I've got a few things to take care of today but, if it's all right, I'd like to come back later. Maybe for dinner? I could bring Chinese..."

She knew what he was doing, of course. He was ingratiating himself by bringing up the things they used to do together in the best of times. Todd was a big fan of Chinese food even if he couldn't work chopsticks to save his life and several nights in the penthouse of ordering in came to her mind immediately. He was also planting himself in La Boulie and right smack in the middle of her kids... their kids... as much as possible.

At this rate, he was going to ask to move in by the end of next week.

Blair thought she should say no but when she looked at him and saw the eagerness in his eyes she could have kicked herself. Her own reservations aside, she couldn't very well keep him away from Starr and Jack and Hope when he'd already lost so much time with him. Sam was his nephew and was already dazzled by his charming uncle and even if Jack resented his father's sudden presence and the changes he had made to his life, well, such was life as a Manning anyway.

"Sure," she smiled. "That sounds nice."

The smile she received in return was almost blinding. She hadn't seen him smile so much since they reunited before he left for Ireland. If he didn't have such a beautiful smile she might find it more disconcerting. He caught her hand in his and pressed her palm against his lips and then backed away. "Okay, see you later."


	17. Chapter 17

The trick, Blair was realizing, was in rearranging her brain to not expect Victor's treatment to come from Todd. She had become accustomed to Victor's way of doing things, particularly in the last four years, and it wasn't as easy to break out of that as she would have liked.

What worked best, she discovered, was encasing herself in a shell of neutrality and focusing on her kids and their reactions to Todd. It worked very well for her.

Todd had been thorough with the dinner order, getting more than enough for everyone and making sure that there were plenty of no shellfish options for her. Her allergy wasn't exactly life-threatening but it was deeply uncomfortable so she happily chowed down on beef and broccoli, mu shu pork and moo goo gai pan along with any other goodies Todd brought.

Jack attempted to help Sam use his chopsticks until Sam got too hungry to mess around with it. Since his Uncle Todd was eating with a fork, he had no problem doing so as well. Dinner was a pleasant affair as Todd started up a conversation about the changes in technology that had occurred during his absence and the things he had already discovered were available to him. Starr had immediately jumped on that and Jack couldn't contain himself as he, too, played the role of tutor on the latest kinds of technology.

Blair remained quiet, watching Jack's reactions particularly, and giving encouraging nods and comments whenever anyone looked her way.

She did notice, however, that Todd's eyes shifted to her more and more as dinner went on. His expression seemed to me moving towards uncertainty as well.

When it came time for fortune cookies everyone took their turn starting with the youngest. Starr read Hope's over her shoulder. "Your life will be happy and peaceful," she said and planted a kiss on the top of her daughter's head. "I hope so," she sighed.

"Your turn, Sam," Blair prompted her youngest.

"Your many hidden talents will become obvious to those around you," Sam read carefully.

Starr laughed. "Nothing ominous about that, is there? Jack, it's you."

"There is yet time enough for you to take a different path," Jack's eyes flickered towards his mother and then back at the table as he tossed the fortune with a carefully constructed lessaiz-faire. "Starr."

"Excitement and intrigue will follow you closely wherever you go," she snorted. "I should get that tattooed on my butt."

Jack barked out a laugh. "Doesn't say much for Hope's peaceful life, does it?"

Starr rolled her eyes. "Your turn, Mom."

Blair pointed at Todd. "Your Dad's younger than I am."

All eyes focused on Todd, except for Hope's as she was concentrating on eating her cookie.

"Really?" Jack asked.

Todd grinned. "Sure is," he cracked open his cookied and read it aloud. "Love is for the lucky and the brave." He looked up at Blair who was leaning her chin on her hand. "Your turn, babe."

Blair blinked then opened her cookie. She paused as her eyes skimmed over the printed fortune before reading it in a soft voice. "There is no limit to love's forbearance, to its trust, its hope, its power to endure." Her voice shook mightily at the end and her eyes were suddenly glistening brightly.

"Bathtime!" Starr sang out loudly, scooping up Hope and nudging Sam off of his chair. "Jack, you get Sam ready for bed while I bathe Hope. Then we can come downstairs for a little bit before its bedtime."

Jack didn't refuse. He ruffled Sam's hair and herded him out of the kitchen, casting a glance at his mother as she furtively wiped her eyes and Todd's gaze remained fixed on hers. As they headed up the stairs, he looked at his sister. "What's going on in there?"

Starr smiled gently at Jack. "Mom's remembering better times," she was well versed with the emotions on her mother's face.

"Why does she look so sad?"

"Because she wants them back."

* * *

Todd sat quietly as Blair dabbed at her eyes. "We got fortunes about love again."

"Yeah," Blair laughed weakly.

Todd remained quiet for another moment, then leaned forward out of his chair to shift into the one next to Blair. He draped one arm along the back of her chair, leaned towards her and kissed her.

Blair was perplexed for a moment as it seemed her entire life with Todd flashed before her eyes but when he lifted his other hand to graze his thumb against her cheek, she closed her eyes and leaned into him just slightly. When was the last time he kissed her like this? Not trying to prove something, as he did at the movie premiere, or in a fit of fight induced lust.

In trying to think back she was hit by a wave of overwhelming sadness. A tear dripped out of one eye, coming to rest on Todd's thumb. He pulled back when he felt it, looking at her in concern.

"What's wrong?"

His voice, soft and low, sent a shiver down her spine. "Nothing," she said immediately, then took a breath and shook her head.

"Blair?"

"I was just trying to remember when the last time you kissed me like that was."

He let the comment hang for a bit. "I never did it as often as I should have," he said at last. "I'm not planning on going another day without kissing you."

She laughed ruefully and got up, gathering boxes of food as she went. "A nice sentiment."

"I'm serious," he followed her, then went back and grabbed more boxes to help her clean up. They put boxes away and rinsed off dishes in silence, piling them in the sink for the housekeeper to deal with the next morning. At that point, they heard footsteps coming down the stairs so Todd decided to let the conversation rest and followed Blair into the living room.

The patience thing was new to him but as much as his lips were still tingling from kissing Blair he knew he couldn't push her. The last thing he would ever do is push her.

"That's a lot of books, Shorty," Todd commented as Starr made herself comfortable. Sam and Hope were playing some amalgam of Spider-Man and Beauty and the Beast on the floor with their figures. Jack was working on-line as Blair took a sentinel spot over his shoulder. It was a strangely domestic scene and Todd's heart ached as he realized he was right in the middle of it.

"Calculus," she replied. "My second course of it."

"Second as in... again?" Todd asked. "I had problems with calculus. Big problems." And those problems led to even bigger ones, he finished silently..

"No, second as in second, I aced my first round and decided to go with my second course while it was still fresh. It's part of my core curriculum and I'm on a roll with it so finishing it up opens up a lot more."

"Two courses of calculus is your core curriculum?" Todd blinked. "It's been awhile since I was in college and, admittedly, I was just there for the football and the parties but... calculus is pretty hard-core. What are you majoring in?"

"Biology."

Jack snorted from the desk. "She's already shown an aptitude for it," he sent a nod in Hope's direction.

Blair flicked him on the ear. "Behave yourself."

"Biology?" Todd sent an impressed look towards Blair. "Our little girl's going to be a scientist?"

"Tell him what specialization you're looking at, sweetheart."

"Herpetology."

Todd had no idea what that was. As he looked around, he saw that Jack, Starr and Blair were all looking at him expectantly with identical smirks on their faces. There was no question who their mother was, that was definite. "Like... herpes?"

They all laughed. Jack grinned up at his mother. "That's the same thing you said!"

It was the first time Todd had seen Jack partake in a good-natured family joke. It was still a surprise to see that Jack's smile was a lot like his own.

"Reptiles and amphibians," Starr informed her father.

"I should have known," he grinned. "What about insects?"

"I got into an intermediate entomology class last semester. It was great. And I hope to have a sub-specialty in that and arachnology as well but herpetology is really where it's at for me. I'm hoping to get the opportunity to visit Galapagos or the Amazon in my later years of study."

Todd gazed at Starr, amazed at what a unique young woman he and Blair had created. Starr's penchant for reptiles had developed while he was away when she was still quite young and he often wondered how Blair had dealt with that when it first cropped up. Blair was a horse girl, herself, but she'd always been unique as well.

"What about you, Jack?"

"What about me?" Jack was immediately on the defensive.

"What do you like in school?"

"Soccer."

"Anything else?"

Jack stared sullenly at the computer screen.

"Jack is actually a very good writer," Blair piped up. "And very creative. What we have to do is figure out how to use that creativity in more productive ways." She squeezed her son's shoulders as he flushed guiltily.

It was strange but fitting, Todd supposed, that his son would wind up being so much like him. He remembered the first time Blair had told him what a good writer he was. He'd always been able to write but Peter Manning had not considered it to be manly enough and discouraged it. He had often made fun of Powell at LU for keeping a journal but Todd had envied him the outlet.

He wondered if he should start doing that now... try to sort his thoughts out. It was worth a shot and might actually help him with Jack.

It wasn't long before Starr took Hope to bed. She returned to gather her books and transfer her homework up to her room. Sam went to bed shortly afterwards and Jack went upstairs at the same time to play some games before going to sleep as well.

All resulting in Todd and Blair, once again, being alone.

"So guess what I did earlier?" Todd asked.

The tone of his voice, a light lilt laced with something like a bit of lust, caught Blair's attention and she narrowed her eyes. "Dare I ask?"

"I got a swimsuit."

"Really?" Her tone was conversational but Blair felt her face getting hot. She had not been able to get the kiss they shared earlier out of her mind and now she was granted images of a mostly naked Todd pulling himself out of the swimming pool dripping wet. It was clear she was going to be spending some quality time with her vibrator tonight.

If she wasn't certain that he'd take it as an absolute green light to invade every aspect of her life, she'd probably have sex with him right now to take the edge off. Unfortunately, she knew that Todd would consider that as confirmation that they were back together and he'd be moved in by morning and have a wedding license by Monday. "Well," she cleared her throat. "I guess that means we'll be seeing you this weekend."

"You'd be seeing me then anyway," Todd's smile was almost feral as his eyes drifted downward slowly before snapping back up to her face. "But, yeah, you'll be seeing me." He cocked his head and his eyebrows went up.

He was giving her the exact same look he gave her in the cabin when he reminded her of the stables!

Yes, she was definitely getting the vibrator out tonight.

The temptation to draw her into bed right that second was profound. Todd ached for her with every fiber of his being but he knew that if he stepped too quickly he'd find himself on the opposite spectrum from Blair. He needed her to be in, at least, a similar place than him. He needed her to be more comfortable and comfortable was exactly what she was not. She didn't trust him deep down and as much as that hurt he was determined to show her that he was the man she could believe in.

But it was going to be a series of long lonely nights before he reached that point with her.

Long, lonely nights indeed.


	18. Chapter 18

The green eyes never changed.

The hair did. The clothes. Even her face, sometimes more full, sometimes thinner and more angular, sometimes young and sometimes older, changed.

Her green eyes were always the same. Smiling... dancing... sparkling...

Her hands reached out to him and her lips curved into a smile then widened into a laugh. As she drew him to her, she spun in his arms before wrapping her own around his neck. Her lips, as ever, were soft and warm and he could feel her fingers twist into the hair at the nape of his neck. As she drew him through a doorway she was suddenly clad in red velvet and they stood in the bedroom of the penthouse she was living in when they first got together.

He remembered it well, all warm tones of gold and brown, as she stood there in a deep, rich red. He reached for her, grasping the hem of her dress and pulling it up her body and over her head. He had benefited a great deal from the fact that Blair had intended that night to end very differently. The undergarments she wore were particularly lush. Deep red silk embroidered with black, the bra and the panties setting off her long, slender torso and her equally long and slender legs.

When he moved to kiss her, she accepted his advance eagerly, but when he pulled back to move them to the bed she was dressed again... this time in that red power suit she wore when they trysted in the stables. Even as he set about removing those clothes from her, images of that time came rushing before his eyes; the black chemise, the way her hair spread beneath her as she lay on her back, the sparkle in her eyes as she welcomed him back into her arms...

He blinked and she was dressed again. This time wearing that silken white nightgown from the night he finally came home from Ireland. He reached forward to slip the straps over her shoulders and watched as the gown puddled at her feet like a pool of liquid light. He stepped towards her again only to find her dressed in another white gown... the one she wore at the premiere when he finally stepped forward to show himself to her.

She stepped towards him, reaching out to run her hands up his arms as she pressed her mouth against his. His fingers trailed down her neck then slipped under the fabric of her dress, pushing it over her shoulders to he could feel her skin. And then suddenly, her dress was gone and he felt her skin against his own, her arms wrapping around his waist as she rubbed her breasts against his chest.

She giggled playfully as she took his hand to lead him to the bed. She climbed on it, looking over her shoulder as she wiggled her ass at him on all fours. Licking his lips in anticipation, Todd followed her, reaching up to bury his hands beneath her hair before running them down her smooth back. Her skin was impossibly soft and he felt his arousal, hard and ready, as he followed the curve of her ass with his hands then around to stroke her thighs before gripping her hips and positioning himself. It had been too long... if he had to wait another moment...

THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP THUMP

Todd's eyes snapped open, the blissful dream disappearing in an eye-blink. He took a deep breath, ready to scream his frustration out to the entire Llanfair household.

"Grampa, Grampa, my pony is the fastest! Look!"

And he let his breath out again. He couldn't very well scream at Jessica's sweet little daughter. She wasn't likely to know that there was someone suffering from an obscene amount of sexual frustration and some serious morning wood in one of the rooms. He tried to close his eyes and recapture the moment that had been interrupted but he was too worked up at that point to relax again. Todd flung the covers off of himself with an angry hiss and went to take a shower.

The shower helped. He spitefully decided to use up all the warm water as recompense for his lost erotic dream and smiled into the shower spray. As the warm water cascaded over him, his body relaxed and he was suddenly reminded of more than one circumstance of being with Blair in the shower. Leaning his head against his forearm on the tiled wall, Todd let the memories come and let his other hand slide down and take care of things.

His hand stroked steadily as he imagined a wet naked Blair available for his perusal, their mouths searching, their tongues teasing and their body sliding together to create a wet, magical friction. It didn't take long for Todd to find his release.

As he leaned against the tile, he started to laugh. A low chuckle at first that shifted into a higher pitched, almost hysterical cackle. "I haven't done that in eight years," he sighed before laughing again.

* * *

There were more Buchanans than usual milling about Llanfair as Todd came down the stairs fussing with his hair. Bo and Nora were both there and both frowned upon seeing them. Todd paused and pressed a hand to his chest. "Are you two coming to see how I'm settling in? I'm so touched."

"Not hardly, Todd," Nora sniped. "We're here to see Clint."

"My heart is broken," Todd continued his descent into the foyer. "Really, it is. Into a million tiny pieces. How will I go on?" He screwed his face up into a mock expression of weepiness before dropping it and sweeping into the kitchen.

Viki was with Lois, getting several large breakfast platters ready. Todd helped himself to some bacon and dodged out of the way when Viki tried to slap it out of his hand.

"You do that again and I'll sneeze all over the food," Todd threatened with a grin as he stuffed a strip of bacon in his mouth.

Lois sent a long-suffering look towards Viki and took one of the platters out. Viki looked at her brother for a moment. "You seem to be in a fairly good mood... especially for you."

For a moment, Todd considered telling her exactly what he had done in the shower just to completely horrify her. The thought made him snicker. He caught the raised eyebrows from Viki and shrugged. "You spend eight years strapped to a chair getting tortured and every day after that is a pretty good one."

Viki didn't look completely convinced but apparently decided not to press the issue. "Well, the various members of Buchanan Enterprises are having a breakfast meeting. Our schedules haven't exactly been coinciding lately so I didn't get the chance to warn you about it."

"Slip a note under my door next time, maybe," Todd suggested.

"I might just," Viki nodded. "I have to ask, though, are you still staying here because I don't see much of you during the day." She gave him a sly glance. "Are you spending your time under another roof? Dorian's perhaps?"

"I don't know what it says about our system of government that Dorian actually has a seat on the Senate," Todd shook his head, "but I am grateful that it keeps her away from Llanview and out of that French mausoleum she calls a home."

"Blair seems to like it," Viki pointed out.

Todd snorted. "Blair lives there but... like it?" He shook his head. "Nothing about that place is Blair. If I have anything to say about it, she's going to be looking for new digs."

"The Penthouse, perhaps?"

"No," Todd said curtly. "The Penthouse doesn't exist anymore and even if it did... we need a fresh start. A place that hasn't been tainted by Delgados and imposters and all that other crap. A new place... one that Blair really loves."

"And she's aware of your plans?"

Todd chewed another strip of bacon thoughtfully. "Deep down she probably is."

"Which means no," Viki sighed and picked up a platter. "What are you plans today?"

"Pool party."

She chuckled. "No, seriously."

Todd furrowed his brow. "I _am_ serious."

Viki opened her mouth, then shut it, then tilted her head as she gave him an appraising look.

"What?"

"Do you even own a swimsuit?" Viki asked. "I don't think I've ever seen you wearing less than two layers of clothing."

"You're my sister," Todd pointed out. "It's not like I'm going to parade around in front of you."

"I appreciate that, but, I've never seen you at the country club pool. Or at anyone's pool. You lived at Dorian's with Blair and there's a pool there, did you ever go in it?"

"I know how to swim," Todd insisted. "And I have a suit for it. I bought it just the other day."

"Well, good for you," Viki nodded, moving towards the door with her platter.

Todd looked after his sister and shoved another strip of bacon in his mouth. Thinking back, he didn't spend a lot of time swimming. When he was younger, he never wanted anyone to see the marks on him that came from Peter's abuse. It became so ingrained that he never really thought about it... and yet where had he wanted to start his life over? Key West. Clearly, he yearned for something about that beach life wearing as little as possible and soaking up the sun.

All of that was changing. He'd been removed from his own life for so long and he couldn't even blame Irene for all of it. He was determined to live; really live. _No more hiding_, he thought as he walked out the kitchen door towards the garage.

* * *

Somewhere in the wee hours of the morning, Blair realized that she had no idea how to host a pool party. In between feverish and erotic dreams about Todd she awoke with a start with party planning panic. It took another hour of fitful tossing and turning before her mind re-engaged and reminded her that it was just immediate family and no one from Martha Stewart was going to be grading her on it.

Hot dogs on the grill, potato chips, pasta salad, fruit salad... Blair couldn't imagine that any of the kids would be interested in sitting down to some fancy meal when they'd been outside in the pool all day.

Dorian would be livid. She didn't believe in 'casual living' and always wanted everything to be spectacular. Then again, Dorian hadn't actually raised any of her kids. They all had come to her mostly grown up and anyway, these were Blair's kids. There was no way in hell she was raising kids who did not know what a hot dog tasted like. Their family was notorious enough without making things worse.

Growing up the way she did, Blair had a fondness for the simple things in life. As much as she yearned for the finest of everything, some of her best times were spent having a drink at Rodi's or sledding down Cemetery Hill on a tray. Dorian would throw a pool party, even if it was just for family, and have it catered and have a new designer swimsuit purchased with a matching cover-up detailed in handworked beading. There would be no splashing allowed and Blair wasn't even certain that Dorian would allow swimming for that matter.

Blair's swimsuit was the same one she had last year and she had a pair of flip flops on rather than high heels. Dorian would probably be horrified at the concept of chips and salsa especially if they were bought from a store. She'd have someone making the tortilla chips by hand and the salsa would be made from market fresh vegetables. The mere thought was exhausting.

She grew increasingly dissatisfied with life at Dorian's house and as time went on, and she continued progressing with a plan she had told no one of, the feeling only grew. That plan was coming along, however, and would soon be at a point where she was going to have to let some people know. She was loathe to do that, though, because as long as she kept it to herself it was a fantastic secret with infinite possibilities.

The minute she told someone it would no longer be hers alone.

She didn't know how long she was going to keep it to herself, though. The more things progressed the more excited she got. Unable to help herself, Blair slipped from the kitchen to the living room where she got out her laptop and fired it up. Three different passwords later she was looking at the detailed workup she had for the renovation of the Capricorn building. The zoning had been approved a year ago for mixed use and since then Blair had been working on restructuring the building. She planned on some spaces above Capricorn to develop into the dream spa she once had for Meldor, a few floors of luxury residential apartments and the top floors of the building would be transformed into a new penthouse for her and the kids. She had a rooftop garden planned with a pool. Balconies on different levels, a private elevator and entrance with the highest security available and plenty of room for her kids. She also had hopes of moving Starr into one of the apartments so her daughter would have privacy but still be close.

Blair wanted to be far closer to work so she could conveniently stay close to her kids as well as pop down to sing or make appearances. Plus, she was done with living on the outskirts of Llanview. She loved the downtown area, especially where Capricorn was. The multi-use zoning had revitalized the place and the area was still on the up-swing. There were too many bad memories surrounding Dorian's house and Blair needed to get away.

The roof gardens were almost done. The set up in the penthouse proper was almost done and soon, so soon, Blair would be able to start with the decorating and when that happened she would tell the kids. She hoped to be in the new place by New Year's. What a wonderful thing... to be in a whole new house to start a whole new year.

"A whole new life..." she whispered with longing.

A knock at the door startled her out of her thoughts of the future. She closed out all of the programs and shut her system down before going towards the door.

"Look at all this stuff I bought!" Todd exclaimed happily when she answered. His arms were full of boxes and what looked like an overnight bag.

Blair stepped back to let him in. "What?"

"Well, I got some pool stuff... all on clearance since it's September," Todd shrugged. "But then I wandered into the Apple store and... let's just say I've got everything imaginable. Do you know how to sync up iPhones and iPads?"

"I do actually," Blair took the pool stuff from him and headed towards the French doors that led out to the patio.

Todd took distinct note of the fact that Blair's cover up didn't exactly do what it claimed to. He got a tantalizing teasing view of her ass underneath it and immediately flashed back to his tantalizing dream. He trailed behind her letting the memory wash over him.

Blair met him back at the door. "Should I be surprised that you're not wearing this swimsuit you claim to have bought?"

Todd held up the overnight bag. "It's in here!"

"You need a whole bag for it? That must be some suit."

"Well, I need to put my clothes somewhere when I'm not in them."

The immediate sexual tension between them was so present it may as well have taken form and danced a jig around the room.

"Well," Blair said, her lips curved in a coquetteish smile. "Let's see about that iPad, hmm?"

They sat together as she explained how it all worked and showed him various apps, warning him that if the kids knew about certain apps he would never see his iPad again. Before either of them knew it, Kelly sailed into the foyer with Joey in tow.

"Hellooooo," she called out happily.

Todd's eyes went right to the ceiling. It figured that Kelly would be the one to interrupt some seriously close time with Blair. That girl had a talent for getting in the way. He heard Blair exhale an irritated sigh and turn on the couch.

"Hey, Kelly, we're in here."

"So I see," Kelly gave them both a significant look. "Looking very cozy at that."

Blair shot a loaded glance at Todd and got up to give her cousin a hug. "It's absolutely gorgeous outside. Go out and grab a drink and I'll tell the kids to come down. Todd, go ahead and change, okay?"

Todd ignored the stunned look Kelly sent his way and grabbed his bag and headed for the cabana.


	19. Chapter 19

Jack and Sam barreled out of the house and leaped into the pool without any preamble. Within moments they were swimming and splashing and being as raucous as two boys could be. Starr's boyfriend James joined in the fun as well when Starr gave him the okay. She was getting Hope's swimmies on as the little girl bounced impatiently wanting to get into the water.

The moment she did, the boys turned down their rough-housing a few notches so as not to alarm their niece but once she was comfortable Jack pounced and tossed her around the water, fueled on by her delighted shrieks.

Todd stepped out of the cabana and came around to where Kelly and Joey was sitting. Blair was digging into the cooler for a bottled water.

"Are you kidding me?" Kelly demanded, lowering her sunglasses to get a better look at Todd. "You get held in some mystery prison for eight years and you come out looking like _that_?"

He was already feeling self-conscious and now he had to deal with Kelly and her shit.

"This isn't all that different than what he looked like before," Blair said softly. "You just never saw it."

"Then shouldn't he have atrophied or something in that prison or whatever it was?" Kelly asked. "You look like you went to some fitness boot camp or something."

Irritated, Todd's lip curled at Kelly. "When you get tortured by electrocution on a near daily basis it gives the muscles a workout."

To her credit, Kelly looked somewhat abashed. She took a sip of her water and looked away, leaning back against Joey. Joey looked a bit uncomfortable at the whole exchange.

"Hey," Todd's voice softened as he stepped towards Blair. "You got anything for me to drink in there?"

"I've got water and soda," Blair grinned impishly at him. "And beer." She turned and bent down to get a bottle out for him.

Todd took the opportunity to give her ass another generous look.

Kelly snorted as she spied what was going on. "Oh please," she muttered.

Todd twisted off the cap and glanced at Kelly. "Jealous?" He snapped his fingers and sent the cap sailing towards Kelly who didn't have the wherewithal to dodge. The cap bounced off her forehead and Todd snorted with laughter.

"Hey!" Kelly's tone was wounded, she looked over her shoulder at Joey as she rubbed her forehead.

Joey burst out laughing. "What? That was an amazing shot!"

"Ooo!" Kelly got off the chair she was sharing with him and moved to the next one over with a pout.

"Sunblock?" Blair asked Todd, ushering him away from Kelly. "You've been out of the sun for so long you're liable to just burst into flame if you're not careful." She grinned at him. "I'll do you if you do me."

Todd's eyebrows shot up and a smirk played across his lips. "Hard to turn _that_ down."

"Hold your arms up," Blair raised her arms parallel to the ground as an example. When Todd did so, she took the beer out of his hand and set it aside then did a quick spray down his front and then moved behind him to get his back.

"The hell?" Todd blustered. Before he could say anything else, Blair pulled her cover-up over her head and held her arms out for him to spray her.

Well, this was the whole reason he wanted to be at this pool party in the first place. He wanted to get good look at Blair in a bathing suit and she was still wearing bikinis and still filling them out exactly right. He took a swig of his beer and sprayed her front down. He did his best to not get overwhelmed by the way her breasts glistened under the spray. She turned around and he gave the clasp of her top a good look, wondering how easy it would be to undo.

She cleared her throat at him as he didn't seem in much of a hurry to get her back. He sprayed her and then handed the bottle back when she turned to face him again.

"Whatever happened to lotion?" Todd asked plaintively.

Blair laughed and gestured at the kids. "The spray is faster and a lot easier to deal with when you've got kids wanting to run around. They sure as hell don't want to get a rubdown from Mom."

"What if I want a rubdown from Mom?"

She gave him a teasing questioning look.

"I mean you, of course," he amended.

"You really think you're ready to lay down and let me run my hands all over you?"

"Ready and willing."

"I'm sure the kids would _love_ to get a look at that."

Todd shrugged. "Okay, you've got a point. Just let me know if you need my help keeping you... moisturized." He wiggled his finger at her.

"I'll keep that in mind," she sat down in a lounge chair under an umbrella. "So how are things at Llanfair?"

"Even more Buchanans than usual this morning," Todd complained. "Plus, I think I'm developing an allergy."

"To what?"

"Viki's house."

"How do you figure that?"

"It's all flowers, have you ever noticed that?"

"Well, the library _is_ pretty flowery."

"So's the guest room," Todd responded. "And the bathroom and the hallway and the foyer and the stairs. When I went back to get my suit to come here, I swear to God, I sneezed the second I walked in."

Blair laughed. "I'm sure."

A loud whoop and a splash interrupted their conversation. They both turned to see Jack climbing out of the water and heading towards the diving board. "Come on, Sam, give it an arc!"

Sam had a Nerf ball in his hands waiting for Jack to give him the nod. When his brother did so, the younger boy threw the ball into a high arc into the air. Jack made a dramatic dive to catch it and came up sputtering and grinning.

"Woo! That's how you do it!"

"Okay, Sam, your turn," Starr's boyfriend, James, motioned for Jack to toss him the ball.

Todd watched the boys for a moment then glanced at Blair with a quick "Excuse me" before jumping into the pool as well. "It's obvious no one here ever played football." He snagged the ball from the air as Jack tossed it towards James again and nodded for them to keep going. "Let's see if this arm even remembers how to throw a ball."

Within a few rounds, even Joey had joined in trading back and forth with Todd throwing the ball for all of the kids, including Starr and Hope.

Blair sat under her umbrella watching her kids and their father play in the water and felt nothing but complete happiness at what she was seeing. She let herself enjoy the moment, watching all of the kids jump off the board attempting to catch the ball in all sorts of outrageous ways. And if watching the kids wasn't wonderful enough, she got to watch Todd's wet naked torso glistening in the sun. She really only got a look at his back as he was facing the kids jumping off the diving board but that just allowed her to gaze at him without pretending to look elsewhere if he happened to glance her way.

She'd spent some quality time with her vibrator the night before but Blair knew that this itch wasn't going to get scratched by modern machinery. She wanted to dig her nails into that beautiful muscled back and feel the weight of her man on top of her again.

"Put your tongue back in your mouth," Kelly murmured, pulling a chaise close to Blair's.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Blair replied feebly.

"Please," Kelly scoffed. "Tell it to someone who doesn't know you... or you and Todd... or sex in general. Do you really think you're not obvious? It's just lucky for you that everyone else is otherwise occupied."

"Why do you think I'm taking the opportunity?" Blair asked with a cheeky grin throwing away all pretense. "I just want to grab him and rub him all over my face."

Kelly choked on her drink. 'Well, there's an image."

Blair laughed. "It is indeed." She sighed. "Look at him with the kids... look at the kids... they all look so happy."

Kelly looked at her cousin, noting the soft expression on her face and felt herself smile as well. "Yeah... yeah they sure do."

Joey tossed the ball for James and then looked at Todd. "What do you think it would take to get Kelly and Blair to join in?"

Todd glanced over his shoulder at Blair's long legs and naked abdomen and wondered the same thing. "You'll never get Kelly in the water."

"Why do you say that?"

"She's no fun."

"Oh come on," Joey grinned. "She's plenty of fun."

Todd gave him a vaguely horrified look. "I... really don't want to know."

Joey frowned for a moment. "What are you... aw... man, I wasn't even... get your mind out of the gutter!" His objection was so good natured that Todd weirdly couldn't help but smile.

"I bet I can prove that Kelly's no fun," Todd said, squeezing the ball in his hands under the water to soak up as much as possible. He noted Jack and Sam bobbing closer looking curious. "Or at the very least, I can prove that Blair is way more fun than her."

Joey shrugged, admittedly curious. "Let's see it..."

Todd turned and whipped the soaked ball towards the ladies. A long stream of water arced over the patio and hit them both square across the face.

Kelly let out a piercing shriek. "What are you doing?!"

Blair also exclaimed in surprise then noted all eyes in the pool on them and the feeling of anticipation that wafted over all of them. She caught Todd watching her hopefully while Joey wore an expression of guarded curiosity and immediately understood. "Men," she muttered, pushing off of the chaise and dropping her sunglasses behind her.

Todd saw her taking long measured steps towards the edge of the pool and couldn't help but admire her slim body in the afternoon sun. Then he heard Sam squawk and he and Jack began to scrabble away as quickly as possible.

Everything seemed to slow down. Blair sailed into the air, tucking her legs up against her body while Jack bellowed "Depth Charge!" and he and Sam both dove under the water. Todd looked from them to Blair just as she hit the water.

How she did it, he wasn't sure, but he wound up with a snout full of water that seemed to be aimed directly at him. Starr and James both started howling with laughter. Jack, Sam and Blair all popped up from the water and joined in.

"What in the hell?!" Todd sputtered, chlorine stinging his nose. "How did you even _do_ that?"

Jack snickered. "No one can cannonball like Mom... that's why we call it the Depth Charge."

"Pinpoint accuracy!" Starr chimed in.

"No one in the water is safe!" Sam finished.

"You're a woman of many talents, Blair," Joey said with obvious admiration.

"Why thank you," she elbowed Todd. "You should know what you're getting into before you start a water fight."

"Maybe this is what I wanted all along," Todd wondered how it was possible for Blair to be even sexier when she was dripping wet and her hair was slicked back but she was and he desperately wished there was a way for him to shove everyone into next week so he could have his way with her, repeatedly, there in the pool.

Blair snatched the ball away from him and threw it at Jack who leapt out of the water to catch it and then started playing a game of swim and catch with Sam and James. She glanced at Todd and grinned at him. "You know, if you'd ever gotten in the pool before this you'd know about some of my talents in the water."

Todd leaned towards her, resting his hand on her hip under the water. "Add it to my list of regrets," he told her. "On the other hand, it's nice that you can still surprise me."

"Surprise, huh?" Blair grinned impishly before jumping out of the water right at him.

The only thing Todd was able to focus on were a pair of boobs flying at his face before Blair smacked against him. He probably could have stayed upright but all that wet, soft flesh pressed against him, clearly angling to dunk him, made him inclined to do whatever the hell Blair wanted. He toppled back into the water, grappling with Blair's slick from as he went under.

Opening his eyes under the water he saw her grinning at him. Her hair billowed around her as she reached forward and tickled him before blowing bubbles at him and heading back towards the surface.

When Todd broke the surface moments after her, he heard her throaty laugh and he couldn't help but smile. _Why wasn't I doing this all along?_ He wondered looking around at the kids splashing and playing and shouting and laughing. A touch of melancholy danced over him and when he looked back at Blair she seemed to understand.

"Just enjoy it," she said softly.


	20. Chapter 20

Blair, Kelly and Starr brought out the various supplies for hot dogs and chips on the patio. Blair got the propane grill going and set about to cooking before Joey snatched the tongs from her and said that it wasn't proper for a Buchanan to let someone else grill anything for them. Blair happily let Joey take over and searched the area for Todd.

She spotted him over in the yard with a beer in hand. His head was down and he seemed to be walking strangely.

"Todd?" She came up to him quietly. "You okay?"

Todd was staring down at his feet. "Do you know... I can't remember the last time I walked barefoot on the grass..."

"Todd..."

"I mean, even before Irene got her mitts on me. Do you remember the last time I just loosened up and had fun?"

Blair thought back. The longer she stayed silent the more distressed Todd appeared.

"Damn, Blair, why'd you ever spend time with me at all?"

"Well, back then you would loosen up a little," Blair reminded him. "I didn't hang out with you because you were the rocking life of the party, Todd. I wasn't exactly Party Time Barbie myself. But we had fun... remember? We made fun of the rest of Llanview. We made each other laugh..."

"We went sledding," Todd remembered. "And we bought all those toys when I first got my hands on the money."

"And the toy store," Blair laughed. "Remember the toy store? Or the time we went around town and just dropped bombs on everyone's life? Or toyed with David Vickers' mind about what really happened that Halloween?" She stepped forward, reaching out with one hand to lift his chin. "So you didn't run around in the grass all that much... we had fun other ways. Is this something you want to do now?"

Todd looked at her, her hair drying in the sun, her shoulders kissed with a golden glow then his eyes shifted to focus behind her where the kids were laughing and playing. "Yes. This is what I want."

"What's stopping you?" Blair asked.

Well, that was a loaded question. As far as walking around in the grass barefoot, nothing was stopping him there. He could do that at Viki's. Llanfair's grounds were expansive and now that he thought about it the idea of escaping the constant stream of Buchanans in and out of Viki's overly floral home by running wild across the grounds like a werewolf appealed to him on an almost visceral level. The rest of it, though, wanting his kids and Blair around him, laughing and playing the way they talked about before he went to Ireland... there were obstacles and the biggest one happened to be the shapely form of the woman he loved.

"Stopping me?" Todd shook his head lightly. "Delaying, is more like it." He sighed and smiled at her. "But I'm still getting all my shit together."

Blair grinned as Joey called out that the hot dogs were ready. "Well, your shit can wait another day. Time to eat, huh?"

* * *

It was almost midnight by the time Todd returned to Llanfair. His lips still tingled from the scorching goodbye kiss he gave Blair but his lids were heavy after a long day in the sun and water. His stamina wasn't the greatest but he'd be damned if he was robbed of any more precious time with Blair and his kids.

The second he caught sight of the flowery wallpaper in the foyer, he sneezed. Three times in succession, in fact. There was no doubt about it, he was becoming allergic to this place.

Despite his weariness, he didn't feel like going to bed. The house was quiet so he decided to take advantage and went into the library.

The floral decor in that room caused another sneezing bout. Todd groaned softly and moved towards the makeshift bar that had been in the same location for as long as he could remember.

"You okay, Todd?"

Todd jumped at the voice and aimed the tongs at where it came from. He peered into the darkness at the form by the windows and waited for his eyes to adjust. "Cord?"

"Yeah, sorry for startling you."

"What are you doing down here?" Todd asked. "In the dark?"

"Thinking."

Todd decided against the retort that was forming on his tongue suggesting that Cord could use all the help in the world at that and turned back to pour himself a few fingers of scotch.

"Don't see you around here much," Cord turned on the desk light and then sat down on the couch.

"That can't possibly be a surprise."

Cord chuckled. "No, I guess it's not. I guess you're spending a lot of time at Dorian's."

"My woman and my kids are there," Todd said sharply. "Of course I'm spending time there."

Cord's lip quirked upwards a bit at Todd's referencing Blair as 'his woman' but he nodded gently. "I can understand that." He paused for several moments. "I went through something similar myself once upon a time. Went missing... fought my way back... came home to find my wife married to another man. My children loved him."

"Was he pretending to be you?"

"No."

"Then it's not the same."

"No," Cord nodded ruefully. "Not completely." He watched Todd for a few moments before speaking again. "Blair was there when I went missing."

Todd's eyes snapped up to meet Cord's. "What?"

"In Jaba City. We were looking for Jake Harrison and things went bad. I got shot and the last thing I remember was Blair jumping into the river after me..."

"But she didn't find you," Todd finished. "I've never heard this story."

"It's the genesis of Tina's hatred for Blair."

"Tina hated Blair because she didn't save you after you got shot and fell into a river?" Todd nodded. "That makes sense. Ironic in a way, since she hated Marty for a pretty similar scenario."

Cord snorted. "Blair hated Marty before that."

"Yeah," Todd mused softly. "Yeah, she did." He was quiet for a moment. "So... Jaba City. On a rescue mission?"

"We posed as medics," Cord remembered, his voice quiet. "And we found Jake but before we could get him out we got caught. It's strange, I haven't thought about that in a long time. Blair's so different from what she was then."

"Different how?"

"She was... colder, in a way," Cord leaned his cheek on his hand. "More calculating. There was plenty of fire and ferocity in her but... it's strange sometimes to think about who she was when she first came to Llanview and who she is now. Hell, even the person she was when I finally came back to town. Putting down roots seemed to change her a lot. She held things so close to the vest back then... it was so hard to read her..." He laughed. "Well, that's not fair. I never was that good at reading her."

"No, you weren't."

"Maybe if I were, I'd have been able to figure out what your friendship with her was about earlier."

Todd scoffed. "Like it would have mattered? You were never right for Blair."

"Wasn't I?"

"No," Todd said matter of factly. "You weren't. You were never going to be the one to make her happy. Hell, you couldn't even manage to put her first for the brief time you were with her."

"Tina was always there," Cord sighed. "Even when we didn't want to be together she was always there."

"So that's why you're down here alone in the dark," Todd realized. "You're thinking about my idiot sister."

"Tina's not an idiot."

"She's not a rocket scientist."

Cord laughed. "No, but she's a hell of a woman."

Todd groaned and pushed out of his chair. "Oh, whatever, man. Just go and marry her again already. You know you want to."

"Yeah," Cord replied softly. "I do... but I have to see something in her, something that tells me that this time it will be different."

Todd paused at those words. It hit a little too close to home because he knew that Blair was waiting to see the exact same thing in him. "Why can't you just love her as she is?"

"Are you asking me that? Or Blair?" Cord's amusement was evident as he stood up. "It's funny how alike you and Tina actually are. She's engaged in baby switches and had a stint in jail and plotted against God knows how many people in her life. It's not easy loving someone who causes so much casual damage. Blair is the toughest woman I know," Cord stopped by Todd and looked at him. "To this day, I don't know half of the things that must have caused her to become that. She told me a few things, she told Max a few things... I imagine she told you a few things, too. I compared her to a cactus flower once, sharp and prickly and thriving off of neglect and I wondered what she would look like and be like if she had someone who was totally in her corner. I did finally see that, you know."

"That so?"

"Sure, I remember the two of you crashing that party all of those years ago. She was the most beautiful woman in the room that night because she was in love with a man who loved her exactly as she was." He chuckled wryly. "Not that she knew it at the time."

"What's your point?"

"I know what it's like to love someone who infuriates you, hurts you, disappoints you... breaks you down and builds you up. Tina and I have been married countless times and we have two beautiful children together. Sound familiar?"

Todd didn't like the idea of having that much in common with his moronic sister. "Yeah, a little too familiar. Hey, it could be worse, though."

"How's that?"

"Viki's been married like nine times. I'd have to work pretty damn hard to match that. Besides, she changes loves of her life as often as she switches out the bouquet in the foyer. Tina and I may be infuriating and hurtful and damaging... but at least we recognize true love and hold onto it no matter what. You gotta give us credit for that one."

Cord looked at him thoughtfully. "You might be right about that one, Todd. You might be right."

* * *

"I think we had our pool party at just the right time," Blair commented as she drove Jack to school. "The weather this week is going to slap us in the face with fall."

"Like you're complaining," Jack rolled his eyes. "You love this time of year. The more bitter it gets outside the more giddy you get."

"My hot apple cider makes it all worth it, though, right?"

"It is pretty good," Jack conceded. "The party was fun. It was kind of awesome when you got Scarface with your depth charge."

"Jack," Blair's voice held a warning. "I thought I told you to knock it off with that name."

"Oh come on," he wheedled. "It's not like he's even here to hear it."

"I want you to get out of the habit of saying it, period."

"It's fitting."

"It's not even remotely clever," Blair admonished him. "Calling a guy with a scar on his face 'Scarface?' Frankly, I'm disappointed in your utter lack of creativity. Not," she continued, raising a finger to make her point, "a challenge. Anyway, you're not fooling anyone you know. You were having fun with him in the pool."

"Whatever."

"Yeah, whatever," Blair glanced at him. "Your birthday's coming up in a couple of weeks. Any thoughts as to what you want to do?"

"I want to see Da- Uncle Victor."

Blair nodded. "I've tried calling about that. No one in that house seems to want to return them. I'll make a point of cornering them if that's what it takes."

"Cool."

"Anything else?"

He shrugged.

"How about a ride?"

Jack perked up a bit at that. "That'd be all right, I guess."

Blair smiled, knowing her teenaged son had given as much of a blessing as he was capable of. "Good. I'll make all the arrangements then."

"I'm running with the guys after school today," Jack said as they turned into the parking lot. He spotted Tyler Givens, the captain of the soccer team, waiting for him. "So don't pick me up right after school."

"When should I?"

"Make it around five," Jack shrugged.

"That's the team captain there, isn't it?" Blair peered through the windshield at the young man in question.

"Yeah, that's Tyler," Jack looked at his mother as she studied the other boy. He wasn't sure what she was looking for exactly. But she focused back on him and smiled, giving him an affectionate pinch on the leg. "Have a good day today, Jack Manning. Learn something and dazzle me."

In spite of himself, Jack grinned. His mother was a dork. "Later Mom."


	21. Chapter 21

Todd was never fond of police stations. He had learned at a very early age that the police were not what everyone seemed to want you to think they were. They weren't around to protect him and his mother from their father's brutality. They looked right through him and couldn't see the bruises on his body back them. He didn't know how to tell them he needed help and they never noticed that he and his mother were in need of it.

Once he got his well-earned reputation as a troublemaker he was the go to guy for the LPD whenever the wind changed. He was their excuse for not actually doing the work. Todd just didn't have a hell of a lot of respect for any of them.

He had a thick folder in his hands as he walked into the LPD and this was one visit he thought he might actually enjoy.

"Manning, what are you doing here?" Bo asked irritably.

Maybe not.

"I've got some paperwork here," Todd said, keeping his voice neutral. "To make sure that everything done in my name while I was otherwise occupied for the last eight years gets stricken from my records."

"That's something the courts need to handle."

"The courts _are_ handling it," Todd snapped as Bo attempted to turn away. "I was advised by my attorney to hand deliver this to you, Commissioner, so that you would be aware that this is happening. I'll be visiting the DA with this as well. Who is your head file clerk so I can be certain this gets the attention it merits?" Todd chose his language carefully wanting to make absolutely sure that Bo knew he meant business.

He was well within his rights to want everything Victor had done in his name off of his records and that included a significant number of things that turned his stomach. At the absolute top of his list, Todd wanted his name removed from Marty's captivity and Blair's rape trial.

With all of the new technology available even in the eight years he'd been gone, Todd had been able to dig around quite a bit. The more he dug, the more he found reasons why Blair was such a closed off tower of ice whenever he tried to broach the subject of what had been going on with her during those years.

It also made him want to beat the shit out of Victor.

Bo finally called someone from records to sit down with Todd and go over everything 'by the book' which was tedious in the extreme. Todd imagined that Bo got some sick pleasure out of it after all given how boring it all was but Todd had a goal in mind and he wasn't about to let it go. He got everything stamped and signed and stamped again before gathering his things in preparation to leave. That's when he saw his assistant wander in.

He still couldn't remember her name. Missy? Tracy? Stacy? Brunhilde? He'd read that some bosses were able to keep track of everyone who worked for them and referred to them by name each time they bumped into each other. He was the boss who never remembered anyone's name. That had been Lou's job. And this new girl didn't strike him as particularly promising in that regard.

"Mr. Manning!" She blinked in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"Paperwork," he replied. "What are _you_ doing here?"

"Detective McBain had some questions for me regarding the fire at The Sun."

Todd's blood ran cold. _Shit, if McBain presses then he's going to put it together that Jack is the one responsible. I am _not_ about to let that happen. Jack's a little shit but he's _my_ little shit and I'll be the one to handle him... well, me and Blair._ He let out a slow breath and then pasted on a friendly smile. "Tell me about it..."

* * *

Tyler Givens was sharing his philosophy on tiki-taka. "It's all about redefining the size of the pitch," he said, "by creating space. You've got a great eye in the mid-field and you can easily take charge when the seniors leave after this year. You've got amazing potential, Jack, are you ready to step up?"

Jack was uncertain as to what the soccer captain was trying to say. His words were one thing but there seemed to be some weight behind them.

"You'll be done with your probation at the end of the year and that's way before the season starts," Tyler went on. "You'll be able to be with the team full time... as long as nothing else happens."

_Ah, there it was,_ Jack sighed. "Well, you never know, right?" Tyler was feeling him out regarding the whole bullying thing. Sometimes, he wondered if he should just start the whole thing over again so people would stop looking at him... waiting for him to fall and fulfill their worst expectations.

"I was close to your age when I went down that road," Tyler said quietly. "Actually, I started in the eighth grade."

"What?"

"I was a bully too, Jack," Tyler said bluntly.

Jack would never have guessed that clean-cut, All-American boy Tyler Givens had ever been a bully. He looked like he grew up with Captain America for a father. He acted that way, too.

"My brother went into the service," Tyler explained. "And I didn't exactly know how to deal with it. I wanted to be just like him. He was strong, athletic, good at everything and I looked up to him completely. When he left, I just didn't know what to do and when he went MIA for a few months and I thought he was dead... that was even worse."

Jack just stared, open-mouthed.

Tyler looked somewhat sheepish. "Look, I know things are crazy with your family. It's hard not to know what's going on there with the way this town is. I'm just here to tell you that I know what it's like when you take the wrong path. And I also know that it doesn't have to be the end of things, you can turn it around."

They stood together outside the school gym and found themselves in the middle of an awkward silence.

"Let's go for a run," Tyler suggested.

Jack thought that was a really good idea.

The run helped. They'd run in silence for a while and then Jack would ask a question and Tyler would answer. They went back and forth about bullying and redemption before they both decided to ice the conversation and talk soccer instead. When they jogged back to the gym to get their things together their talk was relaxed and open. Jack felt strangely hopeful about his life and where it might go.

"Is that your dad?" Tyler asked. "I mean... the one that was missing and just came back?"

Jack looked over to where Todd was standing by a town-car. "Yeah..." this was a surprise, seeing him there. Jack couldn't help but feel wary.

"He looks pretty intense," Tyler noted.

"I think he always looks that way," Jack mumbled, noting that Tyler hit on the nose with his description. Given the situation, Jack was pretty sure he was the reason behind the expression on Todd's face.

"Guess you'd better get over there," Tyler slapped him on the back. "See you tomorrow, Manning."

"I stopped by the house and told your mother that you and I needed to talk," Todd said as Jack approached cautiously. He held out Jack's phone as proof. "She gave this to me to give to you."

Jack looked at his phone. There was a text from Blair on it. "Talk to Todd. We're having tortellini with pesto for dinner tonight. It'll be ready for you when you get home." That was one of Jack's favorite meals so he knew that his mom was doing that special for him. "What do we have to talk about?"

"Get in," Todd jerked his head towards the car and went around to the driver's side.

Jack sensed that this was not the time to pull any attitude. Not to mention that Tyler's talk was still preying on his mind and getting in the way of any smart answers that might want to come out. He got into the car and slouched down in the seat. Todd glanced at his sullen posture and snorted lightly with a brief shake of his head but said nothing further as he started the car.

It was a fifteen minute drive to the Manning Building that housed The Sun. Todd maneuvered the car into his spot in the underground parking and got out, waiting for Jack to follow.

Jack slouched along behind his father wondering what he was in for. The silence from Todd didn't bode well, it evoked the calm before the storm and Jack wasn't sure what the storm would be.

"I was at the police station today," Todd finally said once they were shut into his office. "Which isn't actually all that strange but what _was_ strange was that my assistant showed up, too." He paused and leveled a look at Jack. "Care to guess why?"

"I'm guessing you're going to tell me."

"John McBain called her in," Todd continued. "He called her in for information on the fire that happened here." He stepped forward and leaned towards Jack. "You should be very, very grateful that I got to her first."

"Why's that?" Jack couldn't quite hide the tremor in his voice.

"Because she would have told McBain about your little phone call releasing all of the employees that day. The day off that they all so richly deserved, remember that?"

Jack stared hard at the floor.

"I'm not stupid, Jack," Todd said quietly. "I've known you were the one who started the fire since the day it happened. So has your mother."

"You _told_ her?!" Jack wasn't exactly sure why he chose that to respond to.

Todd's face took on a stormy countenance. "She is your _mother_ and she has been here fighting for you for your entire life," he said roughly. "I have an idea as to how things were when Victor was pretending to be me but I know the mistakes I made with Starr and I am not going to make them with you!"

Jack blinked. "Did you just use the words 'Starr' and 'mistake' in the same sentence?" He looked out the window. "Are there any pigs flying around out there?"

"Okay, smart-ass, sit down," Todd nudged him towards a chair. "You've got an overdeveloped sense of sibling rivalry going on there, you know?"

"You try living with a sister who screws up all the time and everyone still thinks she's perfect," Jack grumbled.

"Have you met Viki?" Todd asked. He cocked his head knowingly at his son. "I'm very familiar with the 'she can do no wrong; I can do no right' family dynamic. This isn't about Starr or Viki, though. This is about you and me and your little attempt to start a career in arson."

Jack trudged over to the chair Todd pointed at and sat down heavily, slouching in his best 'I don't care' manner.

"You do realize that with John calling in my assistant he was about two seconds away from figuring you out, right?" Todd asked. "And if you had been fingered for the arson then your probation states you go to juvie and that's pretty much all she wrote. No more soccer, no more school, no more anything... you're _done_."

Jack hadn't exactly thought of that but now that it was being pointed out so clearly he felt a shiver run down his back. Tyler had just told him that it wasn't the end for him and Jack had almost proven him wrong due to a temper tantrum. "So... why isn't he here with his handcuffs?"

"Because of me."

"Is this where I say thank you?"

"You should," Todd told him. "You _should_ thank me for not allowing you to spend your sophomore year in juvie. Do you want your life to end before it has a chance to begin? Is that what you really want?"

Jack scowled fiercely not wanting to give Todd the satisfaction of his saying no.

"Do you have any idea what jail is like?" Todd asked. "Because I do. If you think your life has been difficult than you are _kidding_ yourself. You are fighting, every second of every day, in there. You are told when you can sleep, when you can eat, when you can use the phone, when you can go to the bathroom. You do not have the luxury of thinking for yourself except for how to survive." He stepped forward and grabbed Jack's face in his hands. "You are my son, Jack Manning. You are my _son_ and I would do _anything_ to keep you from experiencing what I have in my life... in those hell holes that try to take everything from you."

Jack stared at his father despite himself. The look in his eyes, the desperate searching look that bore into him was the same he got from his mother. He had never seen that look from Victor. Ever since he started getting into trouble he thought it was just a look that mothers gave. Now, seeing that same look from Todd he wasn't quite sure.

What did that say about his relationship with Victor?

Jack stepped backwards, out from Todd's grasp. "So... what?"

Todd noted his hesitance and also noted that for a brief second he seemed to reach his son. He sighed lightly and tapped his chin lightly with his finger. "Okay, well, things are going to change now."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," Todd nodded. "You're going to come work for me after school. You're going to spend some father/son time with your _real_ old man and not the faker who took my place for almost your whole life. And you will _not_ call me Scarface anymore."

Jack was surprised that was all there was to it. He was expecting some demands to ally with Todd in his obvious attempts to get Blair back. Then again, he wasn't doing so bad on that front on his own. "What if I don't agree?"

"It's not a negotiation, Jack."

"And you think that blackmailing me into spending time with you is going to make me like you?"

Todd shrugged. "You're a Manning, kid. You're a product of your mother and me," he ignored Jack's shudder at the thought. "We never do things the easy way... or the right way. We do things _our_ way. And as it turns out... it suits us."


	22. Chapter 22

Blair knocked heavily at the door to Victor and Tea's abode. Jack's desire to have Victor around for his birthday and her own questions as to how they were all going to proceed with things given the rather tangled family they were all a part of was what finally drove her to do so. If she had waited Victor out she may have waited until the end of time. The man could be impossibly stubborn.

She hadn't wanted to interfere with whatever he and Tea were doing. She had her hands full with Starr, Jack and Sam. Todd's determined presence in her life also kept her busy. It was hard work to maintain some aspect of normalcy in this situation that was entirely unlike normalcy at all.

Victor opened the door looking fierce. His rigid demeanor didn't shift upon seeing Blair. "What do you want?"

"You to stop being an asshole for one thing," Blair snapped immediately. She and Victor had been involved with each other since his arrival in Llanview. They had been through a great deal together and it was both hurtful and annoying that he treated her with such callousness.

"Don't hold your breath," he grumbled. "Seriously, what do you want?"

"I came to talk to you," she glared at him. "Put your hackles down and invite me in as if you were a real boy, would you?"

"Tea and I might be in the middle of something," Victor taunted.

"If you and Tea were in flagrante delicto," Blair purred. "You wouldn't have answered the door. If you were in the middle of something else, it's clearly something you wanted interrupted or, again, you wouldn't have answered the door."

Victor grudgingly opened the door wider and stepped aside.

"I still know you pretty well, you little shit," she hissed as she walked in.

His face softened into a smile. "I forgot how much I liked your honesty, Blair."

"Whatever," she turned to face him. "Where's Tea?"

"At the university," he shrugged. "Researching legal precedence."

Blair raised an eyebrow. "She's not likely to find any."

"Oh, I know that," Victor ran a hand through his hair and moved into the living room. "And I told her that but she's a bit obsessive and wouldn't rest until she saw that she couldn't find any precedence with her own eyes." He flopped down on the couch. "To be completely honest, Blair, I can't wait for this whole thing to be over with... it's exhausting and it feels like such a waste of time."

Blair was silent as she watched Victor close his eyes. She hadn't expected him to blurt that out but now that she looked at him, he did look exhausted. Fighting with him wasn't as fun as it used to be, it usually just left her sad and deflated, so she was glad to not have to get her hackles up too much. "I came by for a specific reason," she said quietly, sitting down in an armchair.

He opened his eyes and looked at her questioningly.

"Jack's birthday is coming up."

He nodded gently. "How's Jackson doing?"

Blair smiled slightly as Victor used his old nickname for her son. "He's slowly coming back. He would like to see you for his birthday."

He nodded then his expression drifted again. "You know, this situation is likely to get more complicated before it gets better."

Leave it to Victor, Blair sighed inwardly. For all of his bluster and blather, he was often quite capable of sensitivity and insight. Usually when she was least prepared for it. "Victor," she said hesitantly. "What is it you want to do?"

His eyes focused on her, startled. He held her gaze for a moment before letting his wander away. "Well," he laughed. "That's the real question, isn't it? I've tried not to think about it too much but I can't seem to _not_ think about." He paused. "Do you think Todd's going to take this house?"

The way he jumped from topic to topic without preamble had long ceased to startle her. "Why would he want it?" Blair asked.

"Don't pretend like his wanting it would have anything to do with it," Victor replied, rolling his eyes. "I've lived in his headspace for eight years now. He'd take the house out of pure spite and we both know it."

Well, it was no good pretending that Victor wasn't exactly right about that. "Are you asking me to talk to him about it?"

"Would you be willing to?" Victor shrugged. "It would help put an end to the battle we've got going."

"Sometimes I think I'm the only one who actually wants that," Blair said pointedly. "The rest of you hold onto these fights like it's your reason for living."

Victor shook his head. "If you're complaining about the fact that I held onto his identity for as long as I could I'm not going to apologize for that. Maybe you don't get the fact that it was the only identity I had. It may have been stolen or borrowed or forced on me... I don't even know... but it was the only identity I knew!"

Blair had considered that but hadn't really been able to delve too deeply into the concept because she was too busy to set everything right again. "I get that, Victor, but now..."

"Now that it's been decided it's a question of trying to figure out who the hell I am," he groaned as he let his head fall back against the the sofa. "And that's not the easiest course to take when everything you may have been has been wiped clean and the only person who seemed willing to share information is dead."

"Irene was only willing to share what she could use to manipulate," Blair told him. "And I'm sure I don't have to remind you that she tried to have you killed."

"No, you don't have to remind me of that," he said quietly. "This house is mine, Blair. He's never touched it. It's not his and there are precious few things in my life that are mine and mine alone. This house and Dani are really the only things he hasn't horned in on."

"What about Sam?"

Victor lifted his head to look at her. "Sam was the first friend he made here, Blair. He rescued Sam from one of Irene's goons and Sam chirps all day long about his friend Spider-Man."

Blair wasn't sure she liked the direction Victor was going with this. "So, what? Sam's tainted or something?"

"No," Victor said immediately. "He's not... but... look, we both know I've been a pretty absentee father with him since we got him back."

"That's beside the point," Blair shot back. "You're still his father... or doesn't that mean anything to you now?"

"I don't know _what_ means anything to me right now," Victor snapped. "When you've had your entire identity ripped away from you and replaced with nothing, then you can tell me how to deal with it."

"When you whine about Todd horning in on your life after eight years of living his maybe you don't have much of a leg to stand on!"

They stared at each other in icy silence. She folded her arms over her chest and turned her face away from him.

After a few moments he spoke up. "Hey?"

She looked back at him. His expression was softer and slightly sheepish.

She lifted her eyebrows at him.

"I'm glad you're Sam's mother," he said. "I always knew he'd never have a better one than you. It's why I asked you to be that for him in the first place. We weren't in the best of places when that was coming out."

"I remember."

"That was always imperative, you know," Victor told her tapping his temple with a forefinger. "_Blair is the mother of my children_."

"What about Dani?" Blair felt herself flushing. Todd's single-minded attitude towards her mothering always left her feeling self-conscious. Victor's second-hand knowledge of it made it more acute.

"He didn't know about Dani," Victor said. "To be honest, I don't think it would have mattered." He glanced at the clock. "Speaking of which, she'll be home pretty soon and we've got to decide what to do for dinner if Tea remembers to look at a clock in the next hour or so." He pushed off of the couch and gestured to the foyer.

Blair got up from her chair and followed him. "Will you be able to make time for Jack on his birthday?"

"Yes," Victor nodded. "Just text me the whens and wheres. And..." he hesitated. "Will you talk to Todd about the house?"

She nodded then reached forward to give his shoulder a squeeze before she left. She had a dinner of her own to make and Todd was on his way back with their son to discuss the goings on of the day.

* * *

"That thing is _tiny_," Todd remarked, pointing at Jack's iPod Nano. "You listen to music on that?"

"Yeah," Jack shrugged. "Holds a lot."

"What do you listen to?"

Jack glanced at his father and shrugged. Music was an innocuous topic. "I like Muse. Titus Andronicus is pretty cool. Foster the People... I'm kind of getting into some older stuff. AC/DC, Zeppelin, Radiohead."

Todd nodded benignly having no idea what the first three names were. He knew the last three pretty well.

"What did you use to listen to?" Jack asked.

"Oh..." Todd grinned. "Pearl Jam. I was heavy into Pearl Jam."

"They're still around."

"Are they?" Todd had the overwhelming desire to put 'Oceans' on and draw Blair into a sweet, slow dance. "That's good to hear. I used to listen to Zep and AC/DC a lot, too. There's a Zeppelin song that always makes me think of your Mom."

"Do I really want to hear this?" Jack complained. "I swear to God, if it's 'D'yer Mak'er' I'm jumping out of this car right now."

Todd burst out laughing. He knew the song which was a moaning, groaning affair that was highly sexual and he'd be lying if he said it didn't put him in the mood. "No, that's not the one, keep your seatbelt on."

"So what is it?"

"'Tangerine,'" Todd said softly.

Jack didn't respond right away. He knew the song. It had a faraway romantic quality to it and he was a little surprised that the guy so many people described as rough or hard or even unfeeling would select that song as making him think of Blair. "Kind of sappy, isn't it?"

Todd laughed. "Well, I don't think it's _that_ sappy but I guess I see your point. You won't see me getting embarrassed by it, though."

"Why not?"

"Your Mom is worth it."

Jack's eyes snapped towards Todd again. He turned his head to look at him good and long.

"What?" Todd asked.

Jack didn't say anything. He just took a good long look at the man who happily and casually announced that his mother was 'worth it.' His mother definitely attracted men. Jack would have to be deaf and blind not to notice the attention she got. Unfortunately, she hadn't exactly drawn the cream of the crop to her door.

"You know," Todd continued when Jack didn't say anything. "You're getting to the age where you're going to start appreciating the sappy songs, too. One day, everything is normal and the next day, suddenly, the most random things mean a lot because of someone else."

"What, like Rodi's?" Everyone in their family knew about the Rodi's mythos and what it meant to Todd and Blair.

"Yeah, like Rodi's," Todd's voice softened. "Talk about a dive. When I started going there it was a rat trap. Dingy and small and cramped and everything a dive bar should be. The beer was cheap which was perfect for the college crowd and even more perfect when I got out of jail and barely had two cents to rub together. It's kind of weird how many people went there but it was a great dive. And it will always mean something to me because that's where I first saw Blair and it's where I first talked to her... it's where I first heard her sing." He glanced at his son. "You don't get it. Yet. You will." He recalled the girl at The Sun when the fire was put out.

"We all know about Rodi's. What else have you got?" Jack sniffed.

"Oh," Todd grinned. "A park bench... that's where she first touched me."

"If you start talking about where you first had sex, I'm jumping out of this car."

"Too late," Todd said, pulling into the driveway. "We're here. Besides, I wouldn't give you that kind of information. That's between me and your mother. However, just know that if you ever push my buttons, I can tell you exactly where and how you were conceived."

"Augh!" Jack flung himself out of the parked car. "Don't even _say_ that!"

Todd laughed and followed him into the house.

"Hi guys," Blair came into the foyer. She reached forward to give Jack a hug but pulled back. "You went for a run."

"Yeah," Jack shrugged but his Mom gave him a light shove towards the stairs.

"Go shower," she instructed. "Dinner will be just about ready by the time you're done."

Jack headed up the stairs, turning to look down at his parents as he went up the second turn. Blair was smiling at Todd, her face practically glowing, as they greeted each other. He continued up the stairs considering all of it. He wanted his Mom to be happy. Things were always better when she was happy. For so long he had wanted his Mom and Dad to be together again but things were never the same after Starr got pregnant. Victor left them for Marty and then for Tea. He and Blair were different after that, too. His mother let go of Victor even though at the time they all thought she had let go of Todd.

Then came Eli and after that Tomas. Tomas seemed to be going somewhere and Blair was cautious about it all but when Todd revealed himself at the movie premiere it was obvious that things were never going to be the same.

Jack wasn't sure how he felt about _any_ of this.

He was going to have to talk to someone... someone who had a longer frame of reference than he did.

He was going to have to talk to Starr.


	23. Chapter 23

Todd grew increasingly impressed at the way Blair controlled his brood. Was it strange to be thinking of them all in terms of _his_ given how long he had been away from them? He decided it wasn't. He included Sam as his as well because they were all Blair's and what was Blair's belonged to him.

He supposed that it was a primitive way of thinking but he was who he was.

It wasn't that she ran a tight disciplinary ship, it was more along the lines of controlled chaos. Their kids weren't made for stringent control and Todd couldn't remember a time when Blair didn't chafe under the mere concept of 'following the rules' herself. It just wasn't in her. She was a creature of chaos, wind and fire all the way down to her bones but, somehow, she was able to direct their brood into some sort of managed weirdness.

Todd was more than happy to keep Hope occupied again while the kids did homework. When Sam asked him to help him with his spelling words, Todd sent a look towards Blair who nodded gently. The domesticity of it all made his heart ache and he wanted nothing more than to be able to be there all the time.

When Hope's bedtime came, Todd asked Starr if he could put her to bed.

"Sure," she said, her eyes widening just slightly in pleased surprise. "I think she'll like that a lot. But don't let her con you into reading too many stories, okay?"

"I thought Grandpas were supposed to spoil their grandkids," he remarked as he swung his little Peanut up into the air and caught her.

"Spoiling her is fine," Starr replied. "Just not to the point where she doesn't get enough sleep and is a little grumpus tomorrow at LU's daycare when I've got lab."

"Well, if she's so bad," Todd made a goofy face at Hope who giggled, "why not drop her at The Sun tomorrow?"

Jack and Blair snickered in exactly the same way. Blair managed to look somewhat innocent when Todd directed a quizzical glance her way but Jack didn't even bother. "You know, Starr, he's not going to learn unless he lives through it. Send Hope with him tomorrow and after she ruins his computer and throws one of her famous tantrums he might listen to you about letting her get enough sleep." Jack focused on Hope. "Yes, I'm talking about _you_, Terror."

Hope made claws with one hand and swiped playfully in Jack's direction.

"I can handle it," Todd informed everyone and trooped up the stairs with Hope in his arms.

"He has no idea," Jack shook his head.

"No, he doesn't," Sam agreed. "Maybe Hope will throw his phone in the toilet like she did Aunt Dorian's!"

Blair laughed at the memory. "Todd has a long history of dealing with troublesome brats," she said affectionately. "He'd probably find Hope's grumpy antics endearing. The more terrifying you two were the more proud he was," she ruffled Jack's hair and nodded at Starr.

"What do you mean?" Jack demanded. "I don't remember him at all..."

"Doesn't mean he wasn't there," Blair told him. "You were still a baby when you grabbed one of the ornaments off the tree and threw it in the fireplace. He was practically bursting with pride. Said you were a natural athlete. He kept holding you too close to the tree to get you to do it again. You broke a dozen ornaments that year and he loved every second of it."

"He also let Jack do it to piss you off," Starr pointed out.

"Ah yes," Blair leaned over and kissed the top of Jack's head. "Negative attention is still attention, right? No wonder my kids are such menaces." There wasn't a hint of vitriol or disappointment in her voice; just amusement and affection.

"Is it alright if I have the soccer team over for my birthday?" Jack asked suddenly.

Blair blinked. "How many growing teenaged boys with ridiculous appetites are we talking?" She flinched slightly at the number but then shrugged with a nod. "Okay, lots of pizza and soda, we'll use the basement... move the consoles down there so you can set up whatever games you want. And if you feel like playing any soccer, you'll do it outside." She nodded. "Yeah, I think that'll work."

"Ugh," Starr snorted. "I'll take Hope and Sam into Philly. We can go to the Aquarium. We'll be back in the evening for presents. That way you won't have to worry about Sam wanting to hang out and possibly getting hurt when you all start wrestling and crap."

"Hey!" Sam objected.

Starr tossed a pillow at him. "We'll have fun. I'll call River and see if he can take the train in. I'll ask James, too, and if he's not working he can help."

"Saturday morning I've got you to myself," Blair reminded her eldest son. "We're going riding, remember?"

Jack nodded and grinned. A month ago the thought of his birthday filled him with dread just because of all the trouble he had gotten into and who would want to be a part of it? Now it was turning into a Cramer Event and it was for _him_.

Todd came back down the stairs. "Peanut's asleep and I only read her two stories."

Starr smiled. "Good, I'm going to take the rest of my stuff upstairs."

"Me too," Jack piped up suddenly. He gathered his books and shot Starr a significant look.

She looked puzzled for a moment but she nodded.

"Mom, can I watch TV before bed?" Sam asked as he pushed his spelling book aside.

"What do you want to watch?"

"_The Avengers_," he said. "_Earth's Mightiest Heroes_! Some episodes are on the DVR and I haven't had time to watch them yet."

"All right, you can watch two shows before it's time for bed. I'll be up there to check on you, okay?"

Sam darted between Starr and Jack and bounded up the stairs ahead of them.

"What's going on?" Starr asked Jack softly.

"I need to talk to you," her brother replied.

Starr almost dropped her books in shock. She couldn't remember the last time Jack willingly sought her out for anything much less to talk. She stared at him.

"Cut it out or I'll change my mind," he groused.

"You can't blame me for being surprised," she pointed out.

"Whatever," Jack quickened his pace slightly to get her to hurry up.

* * *

"So?" Blair turned to Todd as soon as the kids were up the stairs. "What happened?"

"Everything's fine."

The glare Todd got in response to that comment made him blink.

"What?"

"What. Happened?" Blair asked again through gritted teeth.

"McBain was poking around," Todd sighed. "He got close. Luckily, I was at the police station and caught what was about to happen and put a stop to it."

Blair was quiet as she processed all of that. "What were you doing at the police station?"

"Filing paperwork," Todd replied with a sniff. "Making sure that all of the misdeeds Victor performed in my name were wiped off of my records. I lost enough to that guy. I don't need his handiwork on my rap sheet."

"So," Blair nodded, deciding it was best to avoid that particular thread.. "Back to Jack. Did you tell him?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"I got a lot of attitude and bravado when I told him what went down. He'll be working for me at _The Sun_ some days after school and he's not allowed to call me 'Scarface' anymore."

"You think that's going to last?"

"I'm sure he'll 'accidentally' slip up a time or two," Todd shrugged. "Doesn't matter. I'll have some one on one time with him so it's all worth it." He paused. "I swear to God, Blair, there was a moment... I was talking to him, trying to knock all of that adolescent bullshit out of the way and get him to hear me, and there was a moment when we connected. He was my _son_, _my_ boy, for that moment."

Blair smiled tremulously. "I know what you mean."

"Frustrating as hell when the walls went back up," Todd said. Hearing himself say the words aloud gave him pause. Suddenly it hit him how much like Blair Jack was rather than him. Both Todd and Blair had a tendency to act without thinking but no one would accuse him of hiding his feelings. Blair was the one who built an emotional fortress and pasted on a facade to keep people from knowing what was really going on.

_Holy shit,_ he thought. _I've got to think about this some more..._

"Yes, well, you had a moment," Blair pointed out. "It'll get better. You'll get more, I'm sure of it."

Todd nodded. "Let's hope that this little arson thing was the last gasp of Jack's darker chapter. You and I are on the case now," he reached towards her with one hand and ran it down her arm. "We've got it."

He sounded so sure of himself that Blair couldn't help but smile in response.

"So, the money situation is coming to a head," Todd changed the subject. "We're doing a mediation to see if we can't come to some sort of agreement without going to court."

"How likely is that?"

"Depends on what they want," Todd sat down on the couch and stretched his legs out in front of him. "If they attempt to claim any of my money they're going to be _very_ disappointed."

"Tea will," Blair remarked, sitting next to him. "She doesn't like to give an inch."

"Will you come?" Todd turned his head to look at her.

"To what?" Blair asked stupidly. Surely he wasn't asking her to come to this mediation!

"To the thing," he confirmed. "Hey, maybe we can do it at your club in the afternoon before it opens. Nice, neutral territory."

"How on earth is my club neutral?" Blair frowned. "It's no secret whose side I'm on."

Todd couldn't help but grin at that. "Will you come?"

"You want me with you?" Blair really couldn't grasp it.

"Always."

Was it a thousand years ago she had said as much to him when they were planning their second wedding and she was seeing her doctor about Starr's pregnancy? Blair felt color rise in her cheeks. "I..." she pushed herself off the couch, suddenly uncertain. "I don't know if I really belong there..."

"You belong with me."

Her head snapped around to face him. He leaned back against the couch, looking up at her. His expression was serene but his eyes were sharp.

"We belong together," he told her. "You _know_ that we belong together." He stood up then and took a step closer to her. "Of _course_ I want you there and of _course_ you belong there. This is _our_ fight, Blair. Irene used Victor to take _our_ life from us and we need to get it back. Together."

She stared at him wondering if she was dreaming. How long had she yearned for Todd to reach out to her... to take her hand and say they were in it together, whatever 'it' actually was?

"Will you?" He asked.


	24. Chapter 24

Jack paced in front of Starr's window, his arms folded across his chest and his head tucked in. His legs swung in a casual stride and Starr realized that Blair did the exact same thing when she was trying to think of how to say something. She wondered how she'd never noticed that before.

"Why is our family so weird?!"

She jumped slightly as he burst out with that but then relaxed with a rueful smile. "I used to wonder the exact same thing."

"Yeah, yeah," Jack snorted. "No matter what I think or feel, you thought or felt it first. Rub it in more."

"That's not what I meant," Starr insisted. "I just meant that... you're not alone in thinking that. I was a little younger than you were when I started demanding that Mom and Dad... I mean Victor... be more like everyone else."

"It didn't work, did it?"

"Mom really tried," Starr remembered. "She joined up with some Beautify Llanview group made up of the Ladies Who Lunch crowd. She hated it. She was so completely bored by that crowd but she still tried, for my sake. You know, I never thanked her for trying."

Jack heaved a sigh. "So, Mom tried to be a Lady Who Lunches? What does that even mean?"

"Like Aunt Viki."

Jack snorted contemptuously.

"Hey," Starr frowned. "Aunt Viki's great."

"Really?" Jack asked. "When's the last time she spent any time with us? When Mom booted Victor out last time around, how often did Aunt Viki come by and see us?"

"Hey, Aunt Viki's been dealing with a lot at home, too."

"Whatever," Jack groused. "The fact is that if Mom and Dad... whoever he may be at the moment... aren't together, Viki goes where _he_ is and doesn't give two shits about Mom."

Starr wasn't inclined to badmouth her aunt but she had a sneaking suspicion that Jack was more right than he knew. Her mind quickly sorted through years of memory to get a definite impression that if Blair wasn't involved with Todd then she wasn't a priority for Viki. "Mom's a lot tougher than I thought," she mused.

"We're getting off the subject," Jack said, flopping onto her bed.

"Are we?" Starr asked, she grinned as her brother shot her a dirty look. "Okay, what? What brought all this on?"

"Oh, you might as well know, Mom and Todd do," Jack glared up at the ceiling. "I'm the one who started the fire at The Sun."

"JACK!" Starr bellowed, causing her brother to wince. "What is _wrong_ with you?!"

"Oh, I don't know, Ms. Vandalizing, Hunger-Striking, 'You're Trying to Take Me Away from my Boyfriend so I'm Going to Run Off and Get Knocked Up!' Maybe I was UPSET!" Jack fired back.

Starr snapped her mouth shut and scowled. "How do you even _remember_ all of that?"

"I'm not an idiot, Starr," Jack pointed out. "And you were the little drama vortex of this family for a long time. The point is, it was right after Todd got his identity back from Dad- Victor. I was pissed off so I did something stupid. Sound familiar?"

Jack was pleased to see his sister flush with guilt.

"All right, so... what happened after?"

"Todd told Mom and, apparently, they kept it quiet between them but McPain is still a McPain and got fairly close. Todd made a deal with his assistant to blow smoke and now he's blackmailing me to work at The Sun a few days a week, stop calling him Scarface and share some father/son time with him."

"Growing up Manning," Starr started to laugh. "We just don't do things normal. And before you say anything," she interrupted as Jack took a breath to start in again, "you're as weird as the rest of us considering you started this with your attempt at arson."

"Stupid McPain ruins everything," Jack groused.

"Why do you keep calling him that?"

"Because he is," Jack said. "Need I remind you that he left Mom high and dry when she was recovering from being stabbed... and when was she stabbed? Oh yeah, when he left her high and dry to play White Knight to Cole's Mom! The guy's a jerk and everyone thinks he's a hero."

"He's done heroic things," Starr said lamely. Her heart wasn't into defending John because Jack was absolutely right about him.

"He's as bad as Tea," Jack groused.

"I thought you liked Tea," Starr's surprise was evident. The withering look she got from her brother was startling. It was as if he was silently judging her for being a complete moron.

"I liked her for about five minutes," Jack said. "Back when she was sucking up to Victor in order to get him to bang her and screw Mom over."

The perplexed look on Starr's face made Jack grin. "Wow, Starr, everyone says you're so smart and you couldn't figure that out? Open your eyes, Tea used us to suck up to Dad."

"No," Starr shook her head. "That's not right."

"Just because she uses some stupid Spanish name on you doesn't mean she loves you most," Jack pointed out. "She does it to dig at Mom. Haven't you ever noticed that? Did you notice that she could barely be bothered with any of us after Dani showed up?" He shook his head. "She was all about playing cutesy with me and Sam... bragging about how she loved wrestling and doing her best to be the coolest chick ever... all the while sneering at Mom. Then Dani arrives in the States and she can't be bothered. We were her in first... then Dani was... notice she hasn't squawked once about me and Sam staying with her and Victor since Todd showed up?"

It was alarming to realize that Jack was making some very excellent points. Starr's brow furrowed as she considered what he said. She had been attempting to cut Victor out of her life at the time and wasn't really around for his and Tea's first connection. She did remember the strange off and on status of their relationship and both of them coming to her apartment to talk about it with her.

A shudder went up her spine at the memory. Talk about over-sharing! "I think we're getting off the point a little bit," she said, mentally promising herself to reconsider her own past with Tea. "You were complaining about us not being normal, right?"

"Was there ever any hope for us?"

"No."

They sat in silence for a few moments before Starr started again. "You haven't willingly talked to me about anything real in years. And I always thought you were too young before to get into it, which was stupid of me, because I was lying to cops and framing people for attempted murder when I was Sam's age."

"Little Miss Perfect," Jack teased.

"Growing up Manning, Jack," Starr ignored his jibe, "isn't easy. It's hard as hell and I can't imagine what it would be if Mom didn't love us and protect us as much as she does. Everyone in this town feels sorry for us because of who our parents are. They think we're damned at birth... hell, at conception."

"Come on, really?" Jack winced at even the suggestion that their parents had sex. "Do you _have_ to go there?"

"The point is that everyone expects us to be monsters. Everyone. Mom and Dad think we're great and unique but everyone else is just waiting for us to commit murder or something. When awful things happen to us, no one seems to care very much." She stopped then and gave her brother a severe look. "Is that what happened?"

"Huh?" Jack blinked at her. "What... what are you talking about?"

"Why'd you pick on Shane?"

"Why does that even matter anymore?" Jack groused.

"It matters a lot," Starr pointed out. "It was after everything with Margaret Cochrane, and Mom and Victor being kidnapped, then everyone thinking Mom was dead but she was locked in a mental institution by someone who said they were going to help. Then Spencer Truman and Victor being on Death Row, and then Mom going off the roof and losing the baby and almost dying and Spencer attacking her," she took a deep breath. "And then the search for Sam but Rex telling us that he was dead, and then finding out that he wasn't and Marcie and Michael had him and the huge mess that turned into... then that awful FBI guy who was leaning on Victor and tried to kill Gigi and Shane... but Victor saved them and went to jail for it. Then I got pregnant and our happy family got screwed up again when Victor went nuts and then held Marty in his house and planned to run off..." She trailed off as she watched Jack's lips practically disappear. "Then that awful mess with Dad's old frat buddies and what Powell and Rebecca did to you while they took Mom and Victor and Tea away... And no one ever asked us how we were, did they?"

Jack shook his head slowly. "Mom was always trying to take care of us..."

"But no one else," Starr confirmed. "Not even members of our own family."

"People fussed over you," Jack pointed out, getting off the bed and crossing over to lean against her dresser.. "After you had Hope suddenly they couldn't fawn over you enough. Being kidnapped a few hundred times didn't hurt, I guess."

Starr had a vision of her mother returning from Tahiti after her wedding to Eli and the disastrous fallout. She had a shell-shocked look in her eye but pasted on a smile and assured everyone she was fine. Jack had become well adept at putting on the facade after the horror of Powell threatening him and locking him in a closet. "I don't think I ever realized how much like Mom you are."

Jack frowned. "Everyone says I'm like Dad."

"Because you turned into a bully and people had been expecting you to take after him. They said the same thing about me when I was younger... no one ever talks about us being like Mom." Starr was curious as to why that was. "But you do the same thing she does after she goes through something awful. You both put on a brave front and refuse to talk about it anymore... Jack..." she reached forward and grabbed his hand. "Meanwhile, the entire town practically fell over itself trying to find a match for Shane when he got sick. His Dad lied to us about Sam... we had a funeral for him but no one thought twice about it. You kept quiet and I didn't even think about it because Mom does the same thing. Oh, _Jack_," Starr flung herself at her little brother, who towered over her, and hugged him so tight he grunted.

She looked up at his face and saw that he was about to fall apart.

"Jack... it's okay."

The strangled sob that came out of him surprised her. She couldn't remember the last time Jack had expressed an emotion other than anger or resentment. Starr pushed him onto her bed and then rooted around in her closet and came out with an armload of stuffed animals and piled them on top of him the way she did when he was little.

"You're my little brother, Jack Manning," Starr murmured as she tucked stuffed animals around him and cuddled against his back. "And I'll always be there for you no matter what. This is what being a Manning is about... everyone else may hate us, but we always have each other. Always."


	25. Chapter 25

"What are you guys doing?"

Starr looked over to the doorway to see Sam staring at them with a perplexed look on his face.

Jack hastily mopped his face with a plush bunny and then tossed it at his little brother. "Nothing, what are _you_ doing?"

Sam wandered in and clamored up on the bed, kicking a stuffed spider in Starr's direction. "Jack, are you okay?"

"Why would you ask that, Sam?" Starr asked as Jack pursed his lips together. Jack was half afraid he'd start bawling again at the question.

"Because we haven't done anything like this since I was really little... since before Hope was born," Sam pointed out.

"Did I mention that Mannings are pretty smart and observant, too?" Starr said to Jack.

"I haven't been okay for awhile, Sam," Jack admitted. "I'm sorry about that."

"You'll be okay," Sam said with all confidence. "You're Iron Man!"

Jack couldn't help but grin. "Is that so?"

"Sure," Sam nodded. "Tony Stark is the smartest guy in the world. He can always figure out how to do things... even if he messes up. And he does mess up. _A lot_."

A slow grin of agreement spread across Starr's face. "Yeah, that is true. Tony Stark is a mess but he always figures out how to fix it. Sometimes, he just needs help from the people who care about him the most."

"All right, all right," Jack gave Starr a light shove. "I get it. Thanks Sam."

"So who am I?" Starr asked. "If Jack's Iron Man... who do I get to be?"

Jack plucked the stuffed spider off the bed. "Black Widow!"

Sam laughed loudly at that and his two older siblings couldn't help but join in. "Can we all sleep in here tonight? Like we used to?"

"Ugh," Starr said playfully. "We all have school tomorrow and if we all sleep together we won't actually get any sleep. You kick," she pointed at Sam, "and you snore," she punched Jack on the arm.

"You drool," Sam and Jack said in unison.

Starr looked appalled.

"Seriously," Jack nodded. "If you're facing the wrong way I start dreaming that I'm drowning."

Starr thwapped him in the face with her pillow. Jack retaliated by grabbing her wrists and yelling "Get her, Sam!" Sam attacked Starr's sides with his fingers earning a shriek and a violent twist from her that resulted in the three of them falling off the bed with a loud thump.

"Do I even want to know what's going on in there?" Blair's voice came from down the hall. She looked in to see her three kids in a laughing heap together on the floor and almost burst into tears. How long had it been since the three of them had ridiculous, silly fun together? "What's all this?"

The three Manning kids burst out into giggles as they scrambled up from the floor. "Nothing," Starr said, sharing a conspiratorial grin with her brothers. "We're just growing up Manning."

Sam flung his arms around Blair's waist. "Night Mom!" He let go and padded down the hall to his room.

Jack followed, stopping and giving his mother a hug. "Night Mom," his tone was softer.

Blair looked after her boys and then shot Starr a questioning look.

"I think our Jack is really coming back," Starr smiled. "Whatever groundwork you've been laying has paid off. It's made a difference."

"That's good to hear," Blair said softly.

"Did Dad go back to Aunt Viki's?"

Blair nodded. "I told him to go get some rest. He's got some busy days ahead."

"It's not going to keep him away," Starr pointed out. "You know that, right?"

"Goodnight, Starr."

* * *

The conference room looked like any other conference room. Todd drummed his fingers on the table as his lawyer, Cybil, flipped casually through her files. Blair sat on the other side of him looking tense.

Tea and Victor swept into the room a few minutes later. Or rather, Tea did. Victor looked exhausted, bored and irritated all at the same time. Tea took note of Blair and stopped short. "What is _she_ doing here?"

Blair instantly got her back up at Tea's tone. The hand resting casually on the table balled into a fist as she scowled.

Todd covered said hand with his. "I wanted her here."

Tea's lips tightened. "She doesn't have any right to be here. She's not your wife and she's not your lawyer."

"There's no reason for her not to be here," Cybil replied casually. "She certainly has plenty of input to offer to the proceedings. If your client doesn't object we can go forward."

Tea turned to give Victor a pointed look. He leaned back in his chair and gave her an insolent stare.

"Blair can stay, it's fine by me."

_Trouble in paradise_? Blair wondered as she noted the adversarial vibe between Tea and Victor. Tea liked to fight things out in court. Winning was oxygen to her and she didn't care how she got a victory, she just wanted it. But Victor, Blair studied him, he looked weary in a way that reached further than not getting enough sleep. He looked tired down to his soul and his words about wanting it all to be over echoed in her head.

Much like Todd, Victor wasn't one to voice his fears. Getting him to open up in the past had required patience and a lot of loving effort. He couldn't imagine Tea having the patience for it, if she had even noticed his exhaustion. Blair had the very distinct feeling that Victor did not want to fight over the things that were Todd's because he had his own fight ahead of him. A fight to find a sense of self when he had his whole identity taken away and replaced with that of another.

A sharp stab of sorrow hit Blair then. Victor was facing something very difficult and very different from Todd's own battles.

Tea scowled as she took her seat and jumped right into the purpose of the meeting. "Let's get down to brass texts. Victor successfully ran_ The Sun_ during Todd's absence. There are questions regarding Todd's initial trust fund in the first place. What did Victor Lord, Sr. actually specify in regards to his beneficiary?"

"The money is _mine_," Todd said curtly. "The trust fund was specifically for me. If it hadn't been, I wouldn't have had to answer questions based on my history and upbringing. And do _not_ talk about the past eight years as if I was on vacation. It wasn't an absence it was an abduction and an imprisonment."

The mediator cleared his throat at that point. "Ms. Delgado, we are not in court. Wordplay isn't going to do much here. You want brass texts? Then stick to them. State your reasoning as to why you feel your client deserves a share of the money and how much you're talking about. We can move forward from there."

Blair wasn't particularly thrilled to be there if she had to be honest with herself. The law rarely smiled upon her, whether through cops or lawyers, and it was only Todd's insistence that made her come._ I really am the biggest sucker he's ever known_, she lamented to herself. As Tea droned on, Blair's thoughts wandered to Jack's upcoming birthday and the secret project she'd been working on that she was about ready to unleash.

She was shocked out of her thoughts at Tea's harsh voice getting even harsher. "So instead of coming to a reasonable agreement you'd rather leave Victor, as well as myself and Daniella completely destitute? You won't be happy until we're in the gutter!"

"Destitute?" Blair questioned.

All eyes turned to her.

She sat up straighter in her chair. "Victor, may I speak to you for a moment? In private?"

"Absolutely not," Tea refused even as Victor was getting out of his chair. As he walked to the other side of the room, jerking his head for Blair to come with him, Tea slammed her notebook onto the table angrily.

"Blair," Todd said warningly.

Blair hushed him with a look and went to join Victor on the far side of the room. "Okay, how do you really want to play this?"

His eyebrows rose slightly.

"You and I both know that you are far from destitute," Blair continued in a hushed voice. "If Tea's pressing this issue she either doesn't know or she's going for blood because Todd wouldn't fuck her when she wanted him to."

Victor hissed a laugh at that.

"I know about the Cayman accounts, Victor," Blair reminded him. "And I've got copies of recent statements since you keep forgetting to fix the address information. I know you swiped that money from Mitch Laurence when you first came to town and God knows where _he_ got it all. I _also_ know that those accounts have been used to subsidize _The Sun_ when times were particularly tough so you can quit with the 'I kept this newspaper solvent and successful during a recession' bullshit, too. If I tell everyone at that table about the Cayman accounts then you probably _will_ be destitute by the time the courts are done with you because there is no way the courts will allow you to keep Mitch Laurence's ill-gotten gains. Do you want to risk that?"

"You know, Blair," Victor smiled wistfully. "I really do forget how hot you are when you're taking no prisoners."

She gave him a vaguely bored look.

"What about my house?"

"I promised you the house, I don't go back on my word," she said sharply. "You make sure you come to Jack's birthday because I don't want you conveniently forgetting about that and disappointing him. You come to La Boulie for his party and I'll have Todd hand over the deed then."

"All right," Victor nodded. "Guess I'd better get cracking on changing my account information in the Caymans, too."

"You'd better tell Tea about those accounts, too, if you haven't already. I'm guessing no," she shook her head. "Now maybe we can all get on with our lives."

He shrugged slightly. "Maybe," his voice was far away. "Okay, let's do this." He turned and went back to the table. "Whatever belonged to Todd Manning belongs to Todd Manning," he said. "What do I need to sign to end this?"

"_What_?!" Tea screeched. She shot an accusatory look at Blair. "What did you do?"

Blair sat down, ignoring the questioning looks from everyone in the room, and waited for the whole mess to be over with. This sort of legal wrangling always set her teeth on edge. It wasn't long before the mediator got everything in order despite Tea's vehement protests. Victor breezed out of the conference room, Tea hissing at him the whole way, and Blair found herself wondering what turn that would take when they got home.

Knowing them, it would take a turn she didn't want to consider for much longer.

She noticed that Todd was watching her, his eyes sharp and hawkish, with a carefully schooled neutral expression on his face. A feeling of dread settled into the pit of her stomach and the only thing she wanted to do was get out of there and get away from everyone.

For his part, Todd noted with some alarm that Blair's demeanor was that of a person who was expecting to get hit. He ought to know, he was well versed in that himself. As a child and as a prisoner there was nothing more frightening than a good moment because that's when the strike came... exactly when you didn't think it would.

"Well, Ms. Cramer," Cybil said warmly. "I'm not sure what you did there but you certainly saved a lot of people a lot of time. For that, at least, I'm grateful. Mr. Manning, we've got some paperwork to finish up and then, I believe our business will be concluded."

"Sure," Todd nodded, not taking his eyes off of Blair.

Her face shifted almost imperceptibly and the haunted expression was mostly gone. She smiled a smile that didn't reach her eyes and nodded at him. "Better go and take care of that then," she said, her tone just a little too encouraging. "My work here is done. I'll see you." She brushed past him and out the door before he could say anything.

"Everything okay?" Cybil asked.

Everything was most assuredly _not_ okay from where Todd stood and all he could do was wonder why. Blair had basically given him everything that had been taken from him in one fell swoop and then ran away as if she was expecting the sky to fall. "Sure," he replied automatically. Cybil was a terrific lawyer but she wasn't a confidant and he needed to figure out what was going on with Blair himself.

He followed her to sign and submit any paperwork that was left and then went downtown to buy Blair an appropriate thank you present. He wondered if he could put a bow on Llantano Mountain and give the whole thing to her.

* * *

Blair had done her best to get her mind off of her plummeting mood. Nothing seemed to work. Even going to the Capricorn building and seeing how close her dream home was to being completed hadn't appeased her because it still felt like a million years away.

After several hours she decided she'd take a long bath. If that didn't work, she'd raid the liquor cabinet but she wasn't too fond of the idea of drinking her woes away with a houseful of children. Getting drunk alone also brought back embarrassing memories. No, a bath would be wonderful. She'd really indulge and let herself float away. She got a bottle of cherry blossom scented milk bath and started the water. Then she lit an amber incense stick and waited for the bath to fill, letting the sound of the water combined with the amber and cherry blossom scents to start draining her stress away. After a few minutes, she shed her clothes and turned the water off to prepare to get in.

That's when she heard movement in her bedroom.

None of her kids were that stealthy. They _thought_ they were but there was something ingrained in all of them that left them a little too clumsy or a little too heavy of foot to be truly ninja like. And they all knew never to sneak into her bedroom after the incident where she was almost murdered. They knocked and announced themselves... sometimes too loudly.

Blair reached for the bat that she always kept in the bathroom now and charged out, holding it at the ready.

Todd had absolutely no idea how to react to a stark naked Blair charging at him with a bat in her hands. His mouth hung open and his sex starved eyes took in absolutely everything but the weapon she wielded. Breasts, nipples, that crease where her thigh met her pelvis, those beautiful, enticing curls between her legs.

"_Todd_!" Blair bellowed. "What are you doing here?!"

"What?" He asked stupidly, eyes darting from her breasts to between her legs and back again.

She swung the bat at him. She wasn't close enough to make contact but it did get his attention.

"What?" He asked again, with a bit more presence. He was still having a hard time keeping his eyes above her neck though.

"What are you _doing_ here?"

"Oh," he turned his head to gesture to her vanity table but still couldn't tear his eyes away. "I wanted to surprise you with those."

Blair saw the bouquet of lilies and rest the bat on her shoulder. "I see." She turned to go back and drain her tub. Clearly her relaxing bath wasn't going to happen. "So much for bath time," she muttered.

Todd's eyes rested on her pert bottom as she stalked away from him. Still so tight you could bounce a quarter off of it. He could picture it bouncing underneath him as he pushed himself into her from behind. His own body responded enthusiastically to the idea... it was already making its pleasure at Blair's naked state known. He adjusted himself just as Blair came back into the room.

She was wearing a bra and panties now, her arms filled with the clothes she was wearing earlier. It didn't abate his desire at all.

Blair dumped her clothes into the hamper in her closet and then threw on leggings and a patterned tunic top. "I appreciate the flowers, Todd, but please don't ever sneak into my room."

"You know, if you want to have your bath, I can wait," Todd offered helpfully. "Or join you."

Blair took the flowers and set them on her dresser before shaking her head and heading out the door.

"Do you always have a bat in your bathroom?" Todd asked.

"I do now," she replied.

"I'm sorry if I scared you," Todd continued.

"I'll get over it."

"I really just wanted to get you something to show my appreciation for earlier today," Todd kept going. "I know flowers aren't much but you've always liked them in the past and I know you love lilies."

She didn't respond.

"I just... you really came through for me Blair. You always do."

She stopped when he said that staring out the French doors of the living room that they were now in. "It's nice to have someone you can count on isn't it? Someone who comes through for you... even when you're not on the best of terms. It really means a lot, doesn't it?"

"Yeah," Todd said warily. There was something in Blair's tone that got his hackles up.

"I bet you can guess who that person is for me," she said sweetly.

Well, it wasn't him, Todd knew that all too well and it was one of his greatest regrets. It was something people had been throwing in his face since his return, too. "Dorian?" He didn't think Dorian had been a very good support for Blair but he figured Blair would defend her aunt as she typically did.

Blair stared at him for a moment then took a deep breath and screamed. "_NO ONE_!"

Her voice echoed in the room and Todd found himself in an unusual position. He felt like he was standing outside of himself, separated from the moment by a strange distance that kept him from reacting like he might have several years ago... either with disdain or by shooting accusations at Blair to deflect from his own feelings of guilt. He remembered when he had stood in this very room and unleashed a tirade against Blair for not missing him while he was gone. He remembered standing there and telling her in no uncertain terms that he blamed her for his missing years and how she stood there in return and let him unload.

She put him first and it was painfully obvious that no one had ever done the same for her.

So he'd have to step up and do it... he should have done that years ago and he had promised himself that he would do right by her if he ever got the chance.

He turned and shut the doors between the living room and the foyer. He rested one hand on the doors and took a deep breath before facing her again. "Tell me about it."

"What," Blair shrugged. "You want to hear your stupid ex-wife talk about what a sucker she is?"

"Don't..." Todd shook his head. It hurt to hear her refer to herself like that.

"You think I don't know?" She flopped down on the couch and stared up the ceiling. "You think I don't know that's why you called me when Irene shot you? You think I don't know that I'm stupid enough to keep helping you and now that you've got your identity and your money back that all of this courtship bullshit is going to disappear and you'll go back to working eighteen hours a day at The Sun and probably hire Tea to try to get custody of Jack from me? I hand you everything because I'm horrified that you spent eight years being tortured while I didn't even have a clue and now you're going to use my idiotic sympathies against me."

He sat down on the coffee table next to the couch and leaned towards her. "Your heart is one of the best things about you, Blair." He paused. "That and your legs..."

She shot him a cold glare and shot up off the couch. "I'm glad this is so funny to you."

It actually wasn't funny at all. Todd just didn't know how to make her feel better. He couldn't very well deny what she said before because he had used her heart and her willingness to help him against her constantly for years. She would come through for him and he'd used the opportunity to stab her in the back every time.

"My stupid heart," she muttered, her voice breaking slightly, "has only resulted in a series of betrayals so profound I can't even face them... I can't be honest about them. I just shove them aside until the next person tells me they love me. Max said he loved me and cheated on me. Spencer said he loved me and destroyed my entire life and then drugged me and tried to rape me. Kelly said she loved me and left me on the side of the road to die. Dorian said she loved me and treated everything I ever cared about like something that could be thrown away and replaced. Starr said she loved me and then called me a whore. Eli said he loved me... Tomas said he loved me... you said you loved me... everyone says that and then they..." she dissolved into tears. "How can they do those things to me if they love me?" She bent over slightly, reaching for the back of the nearest chair to steady herself but ended up collapsing into it.

Blair's tears were always painful to listen to because they were always real. Blair never cried for show or for sympathy. Her tears came from the deepest part of her that had learned far too long ago that real emotion was something people didn't want to see from her. That whatever was going on inside of her wasn't as important as the facade she wore on the outside.

Todd stood there listening to her cry and realized that for as much torture he had withstood over the past eight years Blair had gone through something very similar. For him, the people hurting him had been enemies... people who had purposefully taken him and hurt him to get something very specific. Blair had been hurt by people who said they loved her, people who were her family, people she cared about.

He wasn't exactly sure which was worse. He could, at least, compartmentalize the damage. Blair had to look at people, to this day, who had hurt her and never actually be able to voice to them what they had done.

He stepped forward and sank into the chair behind her, sliding his arms around her and pressing his face into her back between her shoulder blades. He felt her stiffen at his touch but he tightened his arms around her and didn't pull away or move. Once upon a time, a heartbroken Blair had cried herself to sleep in his arms after he had denied her attempts to soothe her hurts with his body. It had been the night he acknowledged that she was the first woman he had ever had sex with that he actually liked as a person and a friend.

He hadn't taken good care of his friend... his friend who had such an amazingly big heart that she had reached out and befriended a rapist ex-con. Defended him, protected him, made him feel better, made him feel like a person... and as far as things went, he was probably at the top of the list of people who had done her wrong over the years.

She was the love of his life and he had treated her horribly. He was the one who was supposed to protect her and defend her and take care of her and he had failed on all fronts.

He shifted around slightly so that his lips rested against her ear. She was cocooned in his arms and he felt her body relaxing against him. "I'm so sorry," he whispered, tracing the line of her jaw with his fingertip. "I'm so sorry you had to go through all of that."

And it was true. His Blair was a fierce, ferocious woman who was the strongest person he had ever known. Stronger than Viki, even, because Viki had always had a huge support network while Blair had been on her own from the start. When they had found each other they were supposed to have found the person that would stand by them when no one else would.

Blair had said it at the cabin. She thought she was alone in the world but when she met him she knew she wasn't. She had kept her promise to him all of these years... when he had needed her, she had always come through. She had done as much today.

He hadn't kept his promise to her. That was going to change. And he was going to tell her so. He opened his mouth to say exactly that when instead...

"Blair?"

Tea Delgado's voice broke in.

Blair and Todd pulled away from the back of the chair in unison to see Tea standing in the middle of the room staring down at them indignantly.

"I need to talk to you."

Todd decided that maybe he wasn't all that sorry for how he had treated Delgado over the years. She was still an interfering, interrupting, master of awful timing and if she did or said anything to make Blair feel bad, Todd vowed silently to remove his least favorite ex-wife from Dorian's awful mausoleum personally.


	26. Chapter 26

_Story of my life_, Blair thought as she looked at Tea. Just as she was beginning to feel better, safer and more comfortable, someone comes along to throw cold water on her and remind her that she didn't get to have that sort of thing. At least Tea wasn't throwing actual water on her this time.

"Need to talk to me about what?" Blair said, pushing off of Todd's thigh to stand up.

Todd remained seated for the moment. He seemed to be waiting.

Tea took in the two of them and her nostrils flared. _How cozy_, she thought. _Celebrating the fruits of their labor._ She didn't stop to consider that the mood in the room was far from celebratory or that neither Blair nor Todd looked particularly happy. "I want to know what you said to Victor today."

"Ask Victor," Blair replied.

"I'm asking _you_!"

Blair resented Tea's imperious tone on principle and she sure as hell didn't appreciate it being directed at her in her home. "Ask. Victor." She clipped her words off.

Not for the first time, Todd wondered just what the hell sort of friendship these two had. Tea didn't look particularly friendly at all. She looked like she did during much of his marriage to her when Blair was around; uptight and jealous. Blair was stiff and unyielding but since her back was to him, he couldn't see what her expression was.

"You said something to Victor that made him give up his share of the money and I want to know what it was!"

"Victor didn't give up his share of _anything_," Blair replied cooly. Todd stood up then and moved behind her. "That was _Todd's_ money. It was _always_ Todd's money and Victor never had any claim to it. The only thing Victor did was let go of a fight he didn't want any part of."

"And how would you know that?" Tea scoffed.

"I looked at him!" Blair's voice rose a notch. "I talked to him! I fucking _listened_ to him, too! He's not Todd and he accepts that and in accepting that he's not interested in holding onto the things that _are_ Todd's. Have you noticed that or are you too busy trying to win?"

"Don't you lecture me on my husband!" Tea fumed.

"Then don't come here demanding to know something that your husband should tell you! This is between the two of you!"

"You know what it is!"

"It's still up to him to tell you!" Blair seethed. "I know what it's like to feel outside of your marriage... not a part of it... but I'm not going to stand here and hand you information that is your husband's duty to tell you!" She felt Todd's presence behind her, one hand reaching down to take hold of one of her balled fists. She could feel the heat of his body radiating into her and she felt... supported for possibly the first time in she wasn't sure how long. "Go home and drag it out of him if you have to... and if he doesn't want to tell you, maybe you need to ask him and yourself why that is!"

"This is so typical of you," Tea scoffed. "Todd shows up, _your_ Todd, and you practically break your neck allying yourself with him."

"Maybe I have a problem with someone swooping in and trying to claim a life that doesn't belong to them."

Todd wished he could have jumped forward with a triumphant 'Burn!' but held back. He wanted to see how this played out.

Tea scowled darkly. "Staking your claim on the Manning fortune again? Should we be expecting you to announce you're pregnant soon?"

The temperature in the room seemed to plummet. Blair's eyes narrowed. "I don't know, Tea, feeling antsy? Do you want to try to steal another one of my kids? Might be hard to do when I'm not in a coma." She headed out to the foyer with Tea hot on her heels. Todd followed them not wanting to miss a moment. Blair opened the front door and gestured to it. "Off you go."

"We are _not_ finished!" Tea insisted. "I need to know what you said to Victor!"

"Ask _him_!" Blair took a deep breath and then focused on Tea. "What I said to Victor involves information I had from when he and I were married. You don't get to be a part of that, not from my end. If Victor wants to include you that's up to him. Now go home and talk to your husband and leave me the hell out of it!" She stormed back into the living room.

"We're not finished!" Tea repeated, more shrill than before. She made to follow Blair but Todd got in front of her, effectively stopping her.

"Actually, Delgado, I think it's a pretty good idea that you leave."

Tea's mouth hung open for a moment. She stepped back and took in Todd's countenance with a shrewd eye. "I see."

"Do you?" Todd raised his eyebrows. "I doubt that."

"Please," she sniffed. "How long did I beg for you to give me a fraction of what you gave Blair? You think I don't know what's going on here?"

Todd was pretty sure that Tea didn't have a clue. Oh, she might know what he was actively working on winning Blair back and she might think that Blair was as good as his again. All of those things were true but he was positive that Tea had absolutely no idea just how much damage Blair had suffered over the years and sheer amount of work it required of him just to be near her... especially when she was feeling raw and used like she was right now.

"I know how to take care of my ex-wife," Todd said softly, nodding towards the door.

She eyed him. "That's the least you can do for her." Tea looked like she wanted to continue but instead she turned on her heel and left.

Todd shut the door behind her noting that Tea's last comment was probably the most genuinely friendly thing he had ever heard her say about Blair. Yes, taking care of Blair was the least he could do for her... because he needed to do so much more.

He went back into the living room where Blair was sitting on the couch, her head leaning against the back. He reached forward and flipped a lock of her hair with his fingers as he passed behind her.

She raised her head to look at him. "Did Tea leave?"

"Yeah," he nodded, bending over slightly to slide his hand over her knee as he slipped his other arm behind her neck to envelope her and pull her against him. She looked at him, her face a mixture of suspicion and wonder as he sat as close to her as he could. It made him angry... at himself more than her. To think that just reaching out and holding her was so foreign to her that she didn't trust it. "Let her go back to her mess," he murmured. "She always was a killjoy."

Blair snorted appreciatively and let her head rest on his shoulder.

He leaned his cheek against her hair and just held her there for awhile in silence. "How do you feel?" He said at last.

"Crappy," was the prompt response. "Nothing to be done about it. I'll just feel crappy until I don't feel crappy anymore."

Todd squeezed her a little more tightly against him attempting to will her to not feel crappy anymore. "There's got to be something we can do to help the mood."

Blair laughed a dry, humorless laugh. "I used to go out and find a man to make the bad mood go away."

Todd felt his blood warm up at the mere hint that he could be just such a solution for her.

"I don't do that anymore," she sighed. "It never was a very good cure. Pretty much always felt worse right after. Sometimes during." She shrugged out of his embrace and stood up. "Too bad you can't be casual, Todd," she laughed ruefully. "We could probably take care of this right now."

He had to sit there for a moment and take that in because there was a ridiculous amount wrong with what she said. Once upon a time he had told her that she could use him anytime she wanted to. He hadn't really meant it because if he had, he would have let her use him that night. And he didn't want her to use him now. He didn't want Blair using him to hide from the feeling that her reaching out to him was going to result in his betraying her. There was something seriously screwed up about that. He also didn't want her looking at him casually. He didn't want to be the guy that she'd crawl out of bed with and not care about what had just taken place between them. What they had together was too precious and special and rare to be treated like just another fling.

"Since when are you casual?" He asked her.

She snapped around to look at him, her eyes wide. "What?"

"You're not casual," he pointed out. "You never have been. You just think you are... or pretend you are..." he stood up and walked over to her. "How many men have you used to make yourself feel better, Blair? Only to wind up in long-standing serious relationships with them?"

The surprised expression on her face told him she really hadn't thought about it that way.

"Anyway," he continued. "The last thing I want to be is casual with you."

"Really," she said dryly.

"Blair," he sighed. "If I could... if you'd let me... I'd take you upstairs and spend the next however many hours making love to you... giving you a reunion that's worthy of you. I don't want to be with you because you feel crappy and just want to feel better for a few minutes. I don't want to be with you out of some sense of fear that everything's about to go horribly wrong. I want to be with you because you _matter_, because we're celebrating, because we're _together_. We're together again like we haven't been for almost nine years now. And when we are together I don't want to have to think about getting up and going back to Viki's... I want to be _here_, with you in my arms and our kids down the hall and know that that is how it's going to be."

He watched her as she stared out the French doors to the inky autumn night. "What about you?"

She looked at him in surprise. "What _about_ me?"

She may as well have stabbed him right in the heart. _What about me?_ As if it was absolutely unfathomable for anyone to think of her. It was unfathomable for him not to... standing there, looking beautiful, so beautiful that he ached for her to the very center of his soul.

"It's not just about me wanting to be with you," he said softly. "I want you to want to be with me, too. Because you love me, because you believe in me and us, because you can't imagine your life without me for another second."

Blair stared at him and then turned her head sharply to look outside again.

"I did it all wrong before," he said. "When I came back to Llanview after Tea left... I was all wrong." Todd shook his head, remembering those days. "Viki and Sam had me so brainwashed it wasn't even funny... thinking that Tea was love and my life without her was meaningless. Somewhere inside of me I knew they were wrong. I came back to you and Starr because I remembered, in some dark, forgotten place, that you were what made me happy. But I was so messed up from my time with Tea that I couldn't articulate it and I couldn't show it. And I came about it the wrong way... just the wrong way completely and I messed everything up.

"But now, this time, love isn't some manipulation forced on me by two people I trusted but who never really knew what things were like. Love kept me alive, Blair. _You_ kept me alive and I know exactly how precious and special what we have really is and I'm not afraid to say so or show it... if you'll let me. And I'll wait for you to let me show you. I will. I got my money back today but, like I told you in that airplane all those years ago, it doesn't mean a thing if I don't have you."

Her breath was ragged from how hard she was clearly working to stay in control of herself.

_My towering fortress of snow and ice_, he thought as he watched her. "You need to get some waterproof mascara," he said lightly. "You're going to look like a raccoon in a minute."

She sobbed out a laugh and scrubbed under her eyes with her fingertips. She moved over to the mirror Dorian had on one wall and cleaned herself up as much as possible. She appreciated his attempt at levity. Things were definitely getting a bit too heated. Her heart wanted so much to fall into his arms but her head, her head wouldn't let her.

_Not yet_, she thought. _Not yet_. "Look, I've got an idea for Jack's birthday," she said, changing the subject. "He's on probation so he's not allowed to get a license until April but since Starr got a car at sixteen I think Jack needs to have one so he knows he doesn't fall short on the totem pole. Besides, he can still practice as long as he's got a licensed driver with him. How about you meet us at the stables and we can all go get a car together?"

_I love this woman,_ Todd thought. Here she was, expecting him to stab her in the back and she was still including him in a huge birthday present for their son. "That sounds great. What time?"

"The party here is going to start at one," she said. "So meet us at the stables at around ten. That will give us plenty of time. You might want to have a driver bring you that way one of us can drive my car back and the other can drive Jack and his car back. Or let Jack drive. He'd probably like that a lot."

"Yeah, I'm guessing he probably would."

_What would Blair like?_ He wondered. What could he do to show her that she mattered? That was the real trick. Blair wasn't a big believer in words. People told her things all the time and then they'd do the exact opposite of what their words were supposed to be about. He'd done it himself. He had to come up with something, some gesture, to prove to her that she mattered. _She mattered_. And that wasn't easy because Blair, as well as he knew her, was still a closed book on so many things and refused to open herself up to allow someone else to help her or do something meaningful.

Todd was going to have to delve deeply into everything he had ever known about his Blair. This would require real thought.

He'd do it.

No one knew her better than him.

* * *

Blair had a vivid imagination. She always did. When she was young she would crawl into closets and dream her life away so determinedly it would result in raging headaches. She tried so hard to live in her fantasy world that social workers thought she was pathologically shy and unequipped to interact with the real world on a normal level. She had been labelled as 'special needs' at a time when most people really didn't care to understand it and it had kept her in the system her entire life.

She still had a tendency to imagine her life away. To dream of what might have been. _What if..._ things had been different? What if she had never lied to Todd about being pregnant? Would they have fallen in love anyway? What if he had never left to go to Marty? What if she had gone with him like he asked?

_What if..._

What if...

_What if..._

_What if they could make it work?_

It was more than a little frustrating that as Blair's dream home neared completion she saw Todd ensconced within along with the rest of their family. She could see him puttering about in the kitchen in the morning or working in an office that she was already decorating in her head just for him. She could picture him standing on the balcony looking out over downtown Llanview then turning to her with that rare golden smile that only she ever saw.

The bedroom she had already decorated in her head only seemed to find completion with him in it. If she tried to remove him, she felt his loss keenly.

"Don't, don't, don't," she whispered to herself as she lay on her bed, knees drawn up tightly against her. "Don't get sucked in... he'll hurt you. You _know_ he'll hurt you."

But her heart wouldn't listen. Her heart insisted that Todd was a part of her life, and her future and no matter what her head tried to do, it couldn't erase the possibilities she so desperately yearned to come true.

"Oh, Blair," she groaned to herself. "What is your _deal_?"

The doorbell rang then. It was so unexpected that Blair just furrowed her brow in surprise before it rang again. She glanced at the clock as she got out of bed and put on a robe. It was shortly after midnight. As she got to the landing of the stairs she saw Starr poking her head out of her room.

"Mom?"

"I've got it," she said. "Go back to sleep."

Blair padded down the steps to the foyer as the doorbell rang a third time. She flipped on the front light and looked out the peephole. She stepped back, rubbed her eyes and looked again, then feverishly disarmed the security and undid the locks before flinging the door open with an excited squeal.

Cassie swept into her cousin's embrace, weary and relieved. "I'm _so_ sorry it's so late..."

"I don't care _what_ time it is," Blair insisted. "You are never unwelcome or inconvenient!" She cupped Cassie's face in her hands and smiled at her cousin before spying several bags sitting on the porch behind her. "You seem like you're planning to stay awhile?"

"I hope that's okay."

Blair smiled brilliantly. "More than okay." She moved to bring some of Cassie's bags in. Cassie did the same.

"I've heard about some very interesting developments in Llanview the last few months," Cassie hedged with a knowing look.

"Is that why you're here?"

"I'm here for a lot of reasons," she replied. "But it's one of them. I know Mother is busy in Washington and, let's be honest, she wouldn't exactly be a help to you in this situation given her feelings on the man in question."

Blair smiled to herself. "True."

"So... it's true? Your Todd was gone and replaced by a fake?"

"Unbelievable, huh?"

"Oh," Cassie shrugged knowingly as they trudged upstairs with her luggage. "I'm pretty careful about throwing that word around. I've seen too many unbelievable things actually happen. How are you?"

"You know me," Blair said breezily, as they brought the bags into the room that had always been Cassie's when she visited.

"Yes," Cassie nodded, her voice soft but firm. "I _do_ know you. And I know you're evading the question. Sweetheart... how _are_ you?"

Blair turned to her cousin tearfully. "Cassie... I'm a mess."


	27. Chapter 27

Tea threw her purse onto the couch with a huff and rubbed her eyes.

"So," Victor's voice came from the dark. "What did Blair say?"

She jumped, a delicious shiver running down her spine, turning to where he sat in the shadows. "She told me to talk to you."

"I might have guessed," he said. "We liked to pretend she was an interference but when Blair's done with something, she's done. And she was done with me long before Todd showed up again. She was done with me even when she was trying to keep me from you."

"Is that so?"

"She could have had me and she let me go," Victor stood up from the table and walked towards Tea, still shadowed in darkness. "She let me go when she believed I was Todd because she wasn't interested in begging for scraps from a man she didn't even feel was worth it anymore. She never looked at me the same after Marty. She was done... it just took her awhile to realize it because she's so stubborn."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because you need to hear it," he folded his arms over his chest. "You think I don't know why you went over there? You want to know what she said to me today to make me drop it all."

"What _did_ she say?"

He was quiet for a moment. "What does it matter?"

"Because I want to know!"

"Why?"

How could she explain it? How could she explain the frustration and anger she felt over the fact that Blair was just, somehow, better than her? If Blair had been sick, Tea wouldn't have reached out to her, been her confidant, cared for her the way Blair had done because she would have enjoyed the mere idea that Blair would not be long for the world and it might finally forget her. Todd never forgot her. Even when they left Llanview together he hadn't forgotten Blair.

She had believed, hoped, wished, that in leaving Todd then he would realize that he really loved and needed her and would follow her and find her. Instead, he had taken her departure as, not a realization that Tea mattered, but as the opportunity to return to Llanview and Blair.

After a celibate relationship with her, he had returned to Blair and they'd made a son.

And when she had walked into the Cramer mansion, she had seen Todd wrapped around his beloved Blair, whispering to her, comforting her in ways she had personally never experienced.

"I'm not Todd Manning," Victor said with determined clarity.

"I know that," Tea whispered.

"Good," he nodded, then he moved across the room to flip on the light. "Now comes the hard part."

"What are you talking about?"

"Let go of Todd," he said.

Her mouth dropped open at that.

"I don't want his money. I don't want his name. I don't want anything that continues to connect me to him. I'm not him. It's bad enough we're twins... he probably hates it as much as I do."

"_You_ were the one who wanted to hold onto it all before," Tea pointed out. "You got so angry at me when Claremont got the jump on me regarding the identity."

"I wised up," Victor told her. "I was holding onto his identity because it's the only thing I know. I can't do that now, I have to figure out who the hell I am. You gave me this amazing speech about the life I could create for myself... well now it's time. Are you willing?"

"Willing?" Tea blinked. "Willing to what?"

"Willing to fight for me?"

"Of course," she stepped towards him but was halted when he raised a hand to her.

"Not for Todd, or the things that are Todd's. _Me_. I've got an uncertain future ahead of me, Tea. I don't know what's coming but I have to know that you're going to be with me... not holding onto the remnants of whatever that mess you had with Todd was."

"I love you, Victor."

"Yes," he nodded. "I know. But I'm going to let you think about it all the same. Letting go isn't easy, especially for you, so you really need to be ready and willing to do so if we're going to have a chance."

He turned and went upstairs, leaving Tea alone in the living room to think.

* * *

Todd walked in a slow circle out on the grass in Viki's yard. His shoes and socks were on the back patio and he stared at the ground as he took each step. The ground was cold and it seeped into him through the soles of his feet. He did his best to concentrate on the cold because every time he thought of Blair his entire body reacted. He probably just could have gone to bed but he wanted to think about what he could do... how he could show Blair that she mattered.

It wasn't an easy problem to solve.

He wanted to buy her something expensive and extravagant but his instincts told him that wasn't the way to go.

A shadow caught his eye and he immediately crouched defensively.

"Todd?"

Todd let his breath out in an irritated huff. Of course it was Cord. What else would a cowboy do except wander around the grounds in the dark? He stood up, hunching his shoulders. "What are you doing out here, Roberts?"

"I could ask the same thing of you," Cord said pleasantly. "But I'm betting we're doing the same thing." Cord sat down in one of the metal cafe chairs that remained on the patio. "Thinking about the women in our lives."

"There's something wrong in this world if you and I are hanging out together talking about women," Todd groused.

"Is there?" Cord asked. "Given how we're all intertwined maybe it's not all that wrong."

"I really don't like to think about that."

"Why not?"

Todd sat down in another chair and stared out over the grounds of Llanfair. "Because I don't like thinking of those days."

"What days?"

"The days when Blair and I were married and she was still nuts about you."

Cord sighed into the night, "Is that when you started to hate me?"

"No, I started to hate you before that."

"Really?"

Todd closed his eyes, thinking back. "Blair told me she was seeing you and I congratulated her. I said you were a great guy. And then every time I saw her after that she was crying or she looked like someone had punched her in the gut. Every time I saw her like that was because of you."

"You were in love with her then?"

"She was my _friend_," Todd said sharply. "And I have never had so many friends that I could afford to not give a damn about them... or her as the case may be." Todd wasn't exactly angry at Cord. He was angry at the string of people who had hurt Blair so much over the years that she was a shell of the ferocious, brave girl he had met all those years ago. Still, it was easy to focus that anger and resentment at Cord.

To his merit, Cord was able to recognize projection. He did, after all, love Tina Lord who was a master at it herself. He wondered if it was a family trait. He sat quietly for several moments before he ventured to talk again. "I don't know how it is for most people. I always considered Tina and me to be unique. I've been with other women but there's just something about Tina. She gives me something that no other woman has ever been able to give me. I imagine it's the same with her about me. I give her something no other man is able to give her."

Todd looked at Cord in the darkness. Was this conversation actually happening?

"You said that you and Tina recognized true love and held onto it. I think you're probably right and I have to wonder... if Tina gives me something no one else can, maybe it's the same with you and Blair."

"Maybe..." Todd hedged.

"Tina's hurt me a lot," Cord continued. "And even though my better judgement says we should stay apart, I don't really want to because of what she brings to my life."

"What's that?" Todd asked in spite of himself.

"Color," Cord said softly. "She makes everything brighter."

Todd didn't respond.

"What does Blair bring to your life?"

"Beauty," Todd didn't hesitate._ She's the one beautiful thing in this ugly world._ It probably sounded shallow but Blair's beauty wasn't just on the outside. Her beautiful heart, the thing he probably loved most about her, was the thing that made her reach out to him. It gave him hope and it made him want to be better... no matter how many times he failed.

And she looked at him as if he were beautiful, too._ Even though he was big and hairy and smelly and kinda ugly, she could tell that there was something, deep down, really good about him. And so she fell in love with him. And that kind of love... that kind of love lasts forever._

"It's not just that," Cord said softly. "It goes both ways. I know what I give Tina that she doesn't get anywhere else. What is it that you give Blair?"

"What do you give Tina?"

"Acceptance, And knowing that helps me understand why she holds on so tightly. Knowing what I give to her gives me a little insight into her. It helps me figure out where she's coming from." Cord laughed ruefully. "It's so easy to get caught up in whatever I'm feeling... frustration, anger, disappointment... that I forget. But when I remember to think of her, then I remember what drives her and it makes it easier to understand. It helps me be a bit more patient with her."

_Words of wisdom from Cord Roberts_, Todd thought ruefully._ Is this what my life has come to?_

"Do you know what it is that you give Blair that no one else has?" Cord persisted.

"Yes," Todd said softly. He knew exactly what it was. She had told him so many times.

"What is it?"

"I understand her."

* * *

"So I sold the house and came up here," Cassie explained to Blair. "Savannah isn't where I want to be right now. I want to be closer to River. Close enough to see him perform. Mother being in Washington helps a little and I figure there's always room here so..." she snuggled under the covers of Blair's bed next to her cousin. "I really hope it's not an imposition."

"Never," Blair was adamant. Cassie's timing was more perfect than she knew. She was going to be moving her brood into new digs before the end of the year so it was particularly nice to know that she wasn't leaving Dorian's house abandoned.

"Where's Addie?"

"In Nepal," Blair said. "She's helping rebuild a monastery there."

"You're kidding," Cassie shook her head.

"Not in the slightest," Blair laughed. "Mama's been hardcore into Tai Chi ever since her release and she's also got the idea that after spending her life being cared for by holy sisters she wanted to do her part in helping others. That she's rebuilding a Buddhist temple rather than a Catholic one doesn't seem to bother her, she wants to help where she can."

"That's amazing."

"That's Mama for you."

"Has she seen Todd?"

"Yes."

"What does she say about it all?"

"Mama always loved Todd," Blair shrugged. "She just wants me to be happy."

"Well, she and I are in the same boat on that front. I can't imagine what Mother has said."

"Oh, Dorian has given me the warnings and the reminders and the warnings again and then asked me why I broke up with that wonderful Tomas," Blair closed her eyes. "He speaks French and he lived in Paris for years, that's all Dorian cares about."

Cassie laughed knowingly. "Mother is a bit of a Francophile."

"I've never told her that Todd speaks a smattering of French," Blair giggled. "It'd ruin everything for her."

"I didn't know Todd spoke French."

"Not a lot, a little," Blair sighed. "He's actually got quite a gift for languages. I bet if he wanted to he could be fluent in any number of them."

"You used to speak Japanese," Cassie reminder her.

"I know," Blair groaned. "I haven't used it in so long I probably wouldn't remember anything."

"So, why don't you tell me about Todd?"

Blair cast a glance towards her cousin and heaved a heavy sigh. "I don't know where to start."

"How is he?"

"He seems... okay," Blair said. "He was gone for eight years and he went through some pretty horrific torture but I don't know how deep it goes. It's not like he didn't grow up being tortured, you know?"

"I don't actually," Cassie replied. "I'm not privy to Todd's personal life the way you are. I'd bet he knows a lot more about your early years than I do, too."

"When we were friends and when we were first married," Blair's voice was small and faraway, "we used to talk about everything. Until I ruined everything..."

"Blair, stop that," Cassie's voice was firm. "That was years ago. He forgave you for that. I remember the way he looked when you came to the rectory saying you were going to get married again. He was so in love with you... there wasn't a shred of anything else when he looked at you. What's this really about?"

"He's so... _open_," Blair sighed. "He actually announced he was courting me. He said those words exactly!"

"That doesn't sound horrible," Cassie murmured, stroking Blair's hair.

"It's not horrible," Blair squeezed her eyes shut. "It's not horrible at all. He kisses me all the time. Earlier today he told me he did everything wrong when he came back after Tea because Sam and Viki had him all twisted around to what love really was. He says I kept him alive while he was in this prison, torture-chamber... that his love for me and our kids kept him going. He's reaching out to me in ways that he hasn't since... since all those years ago when we wanted to get married for real and came to you and Andrew in the rectory."

"So what's the problem?"

"It can't be real."

"Why not?"

"It just can't be, it's _never_ real, no matter who it is... I can't ever have something wonderful like that."

"Oh, Blair," Cassie curled up next to Blair, hugging her tightly. "That's not true at all. You can have something wonderful. What's more, you deserve it."

"When you say it, I can almost believe it."

"Blair what do you want? Really?"

Blair was silent for a moment. She closed her eyes and pictured Todd, his hazel eyes looking golden in the light, the ears that stuck out just a little too much, the full lips that twitched and twisted with smiles and smirks that always seemed to reach down to the very heart of her. "Oh... _Todd_," she sighed. "I want him, I want him, I want him, I want him, I want him, I want him..."

"Well," Cassie laughed. "That sounds pretty certain."

"I'm just not ready," Blair said. "I'm not sure if it's right. Not yet."

"Then take your time," Cassie told her. "And make sure it _is_ right. You'll know. You know what you want, honey, that's a good start. All you need to do now is get comfortable with it."

"I'm glad you're here, Cassie."

"So am I."

* * *

Todd sat on the patio staring up at the sky. Cord had long since gone inside to go to bed. Todd remained behind. The stars grew brighter as Llanview sank deeper into the night. He wasn't sure how long he sat out there before he realized he was cold. He looked at his arms where the hairs stood up straight and goose-bumps rose on his flesh.

He ran one finger down his forearm, wondering at it. When was the last time he even saw that? When was the last time he was cold because he was outside and the temperature had dropped? As usual, he thought of Blair. She loved the cold. He thought of coming in from the cold of Llanview and the way she would kiss him when they were first married, when they were married again, the way her lips were warm against the cold air and made him want her all the more.

He could imagine the warmth of her body as they lay under stars like this and made a mental note to do just that. Soon.

But he didn't have her now and he wasn't a big fan of the cold on its own so he stood up and went inside. He wasn't tired, though. He clicked on the light and sneezed the second he got a look at Viki's overly floral decor. He wanted to be out of Llanfair and wherever Blair was. Even if where Blair was was Dorian's tacky French mausoleum.

Viki's house wasn't home. It never was and wasn't likely to be. He loved Viki, he loved Jessica, and the kids were sweet but he wanted his family. He sat down in a chair with a huff and winced when he felt as though something had the cushion off kilter. Digging between the cushion and the chair itself, Todd pulled out a thick folder that had been wedged in.

"Buchanan Enterprises," he read aloud with a slow grin spreading across his face. "I could do with some light reading."

It was over an hour of perusing the listings of stocks and splinter companies before Todd's bleary eyes settled on the one thing he knew was going to change everything for him and Blair.

"Daimler Designs."

_I understand her._


	28. Chapter 28

"What do you mean I have to give up the house?"

Todd sat on the couch in the living room of La Boulie. More to the point, he was sprawled indignantly on it, taking up as much room as humanly possible, legs splayed out, one arm draped across the back, the other balled into a fist on one thigh as he stared at Blair with an expression of annoyance.

"You know what I mean," Blair was going down a list she had made up in preparation for Jack's party. On her checklist was: Get Todd to sign over the deed to Victor's house. She had a feeling it might take some wrangling.

"Why should I?"

"Why shouldn't you?"

Todd scowled. "Technically, that house belongs to me."

"Technically it does," Blair agreed. "When are you planning on moving in?"

His scowl grew more fierce.

"You have no desire to move in," Blair said. "And why would you? Why would you want to move into the house that Victor bought for Marty? The little love nest that he set up with your rape victim while he believed he was you... and then the same love nest he set up with Tea? I can tell you which room he had sex with Marty in, maybe you'll want to live in that one."

"You're being gross," Todd grumbled. "Really gross."

Blair smiled wanly at him. "For a reason."

"I have every right to be angry at him."

"Be angry all you want," she said. "Maybe, this time, you don't go straight for petty."

He snorted.

"Taking the house, keeping the house, would be petty and you know it," Blair continued. "And anyway, you're going to have to establish some sort of reasonable relationship if you want to get to know your daughter."

He looked at her blankly.

"Danielle," Blair reminded him.

"Oh." Todd's tongue snaked behind his lower lip. It was a tic that Blair didn't realize she had missed so much. It didn't help that it always made her think of other things he could do with his tongue. "Can I talk to you about that?"

"About what?" Blair's voice took on a cautious tone.

"I really don't think that kid is mine."

Blair just stared at him for a moment, mouth slightly agape. "Why would you even say that?"

"Because I don't think that kid is mine."

"Did you or did you not have sex with Tea on your stupid deserted island?" Blair demanded, her voice a bit more shrill than she would have wanted. She liked to consider herself above such things but she really did get ridiculously jealous when it came to Todd.

Todd squirmed uncomfortably on the couch. "In the most technical of terms, yes," he hedged. "But, at the same time, not really."

"You don't have to tell me this," Blair said. "You really don't. You also don't have to pretend it didn't happen when there's a kid walking around and the tests proved she was yours. I came to terms with it, Todd. It is what it is."

"But maybe it isn't," Todd insisted. "Because there's really no way in hell that what she and I did in the ocean could have resulted in a kid."

"Oh man," Blair cringed. "I don't want to hear that!" She clapped her hands over her ears, wincing. "I came to terms with it, Todd! I don't need to know what position you did it in or which hole you put it in!"

It was Todd's turn to gape, open-mouthed, at Blair. "_Gross_!" His voice went up in pitch as he expressed his revulsion at what Blair was suggesting. "No! NO! Not... _no_! Ewwww!"

"Don't tell me you never wanted to do _that_," Blair waved her hand over her bottom. "Because I _know_ you and we've _done_ that."

"Yeah, _we've_ done that," Todd grinned at the memory. Blair was a tiger in the sack, no question. And experimental, too! "Hey, do you still have those feathers?"

"Are you _kidding_ me right now?"

"I never wanted to do _that_," Todd pointed at Blair's ass, "with her. And I _didn't_ do that with her. I barely had _normal_ sex with her." He stood up and took a step towards Blair. "That's what I'm trying to say."

"Todd all it takes is once," Blair reminded him, backing away a step.

"Well, for us that's all it took," he grinned salaciously at her. "But, again, that's not what I'm trying to say."

Blair sighed heavily. "Then say it."

"There's a certain thing that needs to happen in order for a man to impregnate a woman that very definitely didn't happen when I did what I did with Delgado," Todd looked up at the ceiling. "Because I didn't do what guys normally do when they have sex... if you know what I mean."

Blair stared at him as it dawned on her what he was trying to say. "Are you telling me that you didn't..."

Todd nodded.

"No orgasm? Is that what you're saying?"

"Yes, that's what I'm saying. No to the orgasm. I did not get off to put it in terms I'm more comfortable with."

"And she didn't notice that?"

Todd rolled his eyes. "I wasn't even all the way hard when I... you know... went in," he noted with some satisfaction Blair's smirk. His babe wasn't completely over the concept of having one over on an enemy, or whatever Delgado was to her. "And it got less so as it went on. I just acted the part... jerked around some, made the appropriate noises... she had clearly built it up so much in her head that I don't know I was even necessary to be honest. And being that we were in salt water... well..." he shrugged.

Blair barked out a laugh and slapped her hand over her mouth. "I really shouldn't laugh at that..."

"Oh, I don't know," Todd grinned in return. "I guess it is kind of funny."

"But Danielle's DNA came back as proof positive she was yours."

"I've noticed this town has a lousy reputation in giving accurate DNA readings," Todd pointed out.

"That's true," Blair conceded. "So, how are you going to broach this with Tea? You're going to have to bring up the paternity issue at some point."

"Delgado probably doesn't want me to be Danielle's father anymore," Todd pointed out.

"Or she may be so pissed about the whole identity thing and Victor giving up your money that she'll try to wring you out for missing child care or something." Blair suggested. "I wouldn't put it past her."

"I thought you liked her now," Todd said.

"That doesn't mean I don't know who she is."

Todd was happy to hear that. The whole concept of Blair and Tea being friendly was still bizarre to him. Even if they had made peace they could still get into it as they did the other night.

"What about the house?"

Todd groaned. "Back to that?"

"I promised Victor you'd give it to him."

"Well, you shouldn't have done that."

"Don't make a liar out of me, Todd," Blair told him softly. "It's not worth it for that awful house."

Todd sullenly mulled that over. "Does he have any of my stuff?"

"What do you mean?"

"My stuff? Like my CDs or movies or stuff like that."

"He probably has some of it," Blair shrugged. "I've got some stuff up in boxes in the attic, too."

"I want my stuff before I give him the house," Todd folded his arms over his chest.

Blair sighed. She already had a houseful of stubborn, willful children to deal with, she really wished that Todd could make a mature decision on his own once in awhile and take the pressure off. Why was she the one who always had to be responsible? "Then go over there and ask him if he's got your stuff and take it back. Have the deed ready to sign over at Jack's party. You can do that, you're a big boy, aren't you?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Todd didn't like the sarcastic tone in her voice.

"It means that if you've got things to straighten out with your brother than you need to figure out a way to do that," Blair said sharply. "You don't need me to feed you the answers, Todd. God, you tell me you're courting me and you want to pursue a relationship? Well, I'm not interested in boys. I need a man. A man who can figure things out for himself and do what needs to be done. You used to be that man, remember? When you bought out the Omega Building from Asa and created a newspaper out of an old rag... _that_ was a man. Now you're standing there whining about your stuff. You sound like Jack and Sam arguing over a video game."

"Where did that come from?" Todd wasn't exactly upset because Blair was actually talking about him in reference to a relationship.

"This whole crap about the house!" Blair snapped. "Victor wants it, you don't want to give it to him. You're like two squabbling three year olds and I'm sick of it. I want it over with, Todd! Now you're bitching about your stuff, whatever that is. Go over there and get it, I've done my part, I can't lead you the whole way there."

"I _will_ get it!"

"Good!"

"I'm going right now!"

"Fine!"

Todd stormed out of the house and slammed the door behind him. He stood on the front step and took a deep breath of the chilly autumn air. "God, I want that woman."

* * *

The doorbell rang five times in succession and Victor had a feeling he knew who was on the other side of it.

Opening the door confirmed his suspicions. Todd was glaring at him from the doorway.

"What do _you_ want?" Victor asked.

"I want my things," Todd said, blowing through the door, bumping his shoulder against Victor's.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"Blair told me about your little house deal with her," Todd snarled.

"And?"

"And I want anything you have here that belonged to me before I hand this ugly house over and give up any rights to my things."

"Is that so?"

"Yeah, that's so."

Victor eyed Todd for a few minutes. "I could make things difficult for you."

"So could I," Todd shot back.

They sized each other up for a few moments.

"Alright," Victor headed up the stairs. "Come with me."

As they went down the hall toward his and Tea's bedroom, Todd glanced around feeling more and more uncomfortable. Blair was right. He didn't want to hold onto this house... to be petty or any other reason. He didn't like anything about it and every door he passed he wondered if that was the room Victor had sex with Marty in.

Which was the last thing he wanted to think about.

"I've actually been putting your things together," Victor said as he opened the door to the bedroom. "I've been wanting to put aside this whole 'hold onto your identity' crap and focus on figuring mine out. So, this is what I've put together so far..." he got a box out of the closet and set it on the bed.

Todd looked in. There wasn't much there. Some CDs, a ratty old copy of 'Lord of the Banner' and some pictures of Starr and Jack when they were still infants. "There's not much here."

"How much stuff did you really have, Todd?" Victor asked, sitting on the bed. "You've never been sentimental over things."

Todd rifled through the paltry items. Pearl Jam's '10' was in there, as was Led Zeppelin 1 through 4. "Maybe I'm sentimental now."

"Doesn't mean there's much to take with you," Victor pointed out. "Blair probably has more. She's sentimental... and she's sentimental for your sake, too. You remember things but you didn't really keep things. You took off too often, you know?"

Todd had left everything behind when he left town after the whole fake DID debacle. It was true. Items didn't mean much to him... "The pictures mean something."

"Yeah," Victor nodded. "Well, there they are."

Todd knew that Blair still had the picture of their second wedding. That was the thing he held closest to his heart. Without that moment, he wouldn't have had anything that followed, good or bad.

It wasn't too long after that Todd gathered up the box and let Victor lead him back to the foyer of the house. "We do need to talk about the cars," Todd said. "I don't recognize the ones in your driveway and if you bought them with my money then you can buy them back with yours."

Victor shrugged. "Are you going to take depreciation into account?"

"Would you?'

Danielle's voice wafted through the hallway from the foyer. Her words weren't clear but her tone certainly was. Victor ran down the hallway to find out what was going on, Todd close behind.

"Daniella," Tea was trying to be soothing. "You're not making any sense."

"I want to know why you lied!"

"About what, sweetheart!"

"About my father!"

"What's going on?" Victor asked, descending the stairs and reaching out to Dani to comfort her.

The girl spied Todd and demanded loudly. "What's your blood type?"

"O-," Todd and Victor replied promptly and unison.

"What's yours?" Dani asked Tea.

"B," Tea replied.

"What was Dad's?" Dani demanded. When Tea didn't respond her voice got more shrill. "Ross! What was his?"

"A+," Tea said gently.

"And what am I?" Dani asked.

"AB," Tea nodded.

"Then he is not my father," she pointed angrily at Todd and shoved a paper at Tea. "It's impossible. I'm AB and that blood type does not come from O anything. Period! Why did you lie to me?!"

Tea took the paper from her daughter and read it. Her face paled as she did so and she looked at Todd. "Would you mind leaving? I need to speak to my daughter..."

Todd reached forward and plucked the paper from Tea's hands. It was a quick rundown of blood types that appeared to be part of a science project at school. The graph made it very clear that he couldn't possibly be Danielle's father given his blood type and hers. He handed the paper back trying very hard not to smile. "It does seem like this is a family issue," he nodded before reaching for the door and letting himself out.

Once the door was shut, he looked up into the sky and smiled broadly. "I knew it," he whispered.

The last tie between he and Tea had been severed.

He went to go tell Blair the good news. And gloat just a little bit.


	29. Chapter 29

"Hi Dad," Starr poked her head through the door of Todd's office.

He grinned and waved her in only to see Starr shift a bit and then unleash Hope into the office.

Hope ran right to Todd and flung herself at his lap in a quick hug before running to the couch and scrambling up on it looking at her mother expectantly.

Starr had her iPad out and was fiddling with it before getting it onto an app for Hope to play.

"What's she doing?" Todd asked as Starr pulled a chair closer to his desk.

"Butterfly Farm," Starr said.

"Bugs," Todd laughed. "Of course."

"What am I going to let her play?" Starr frowned. "Some stupid dress up app? Not my daughter. She can play dress up at home with actual clothes but I'm not raising her to be some frilly little princess."

"We called you 'Princess' all the time," Todd point out. "And you still liked spiders, snakes and bugs. Maybe she'll like horses like her grandma."

Starr laughed. "We do play 'My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic' together on that thing. We watch it, too."

"You're kidding."

"It's actually pretty cool. Sam watches it with us sometimes."

"I thought Sam liked Spider-Man."

"Sam loves Spider-Man. He also loves 'Avatar, Legend of Korra' and 'Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.' Mom watches the movie _Thor_ with him whenever he wants."

"Is that so?"

Starr nodded. "It doesn't hurt that the guy who plays Thor is ridiculously hot and ripped."

"Oh really?"

"Yep. But what can you expect? He's a god, after all. She plans on test screening _Captain America_ to make sure that's suitable for Sam pretty soon but I'm sure that the shot of the buffed up Cap in the commercials has nothing to do with that."

"_Captain America_? Are you kidding me?"

"You know Mom loves her good guys."

"No one can compete with Captain America. He's the ultimate boy scout!"

"Well, be thankful that he's not real, then. Anyway, Mom's never been able to make a relationship with one of her boy scouts work. Usually because they turn out to be assholes."

Todd's eyebrows shot up at that. "I've been out of it way too long if you're swearing like it's no big deal."

Starr looked over her shoulder at Hope who was engrossed in her game. "Well, I slip sometimes."

"Speaking of your mother and letting things slip," Todd said, leaning back in his chair. "Maybe you'd like to tell me about when you called her a whore."

Starr's mouth dropped open. "She told you about that?"

Todd considered the question. "She didn't rat you out if that's what you're asking. She had a bit of a meltdown the other day... kind of went down the list of all the people she loved who said they loved her and then treated her like crap. You were one in a long list... but I want to know what happened there."

"I was angry and stupid," Starr said quietly. "And it was about Spencer Truman and I was just... _really_ angry at Mom."

"Were you right to be?"

"No," Starr responded. "Well, yes and no. You have to understand Spencer Truman... he was horrible but he played it all so brilliantly that everything fell into place the way it did because he wanted it to. He was obsessed with Mom the moment he saw her... she was happy with Victor and we were all together after the Margaret Cochran mess, putting our lives back together and Spencer wanted Mom and destroyed her life to have her."

"But you saw through him?"

"No," Starr admitted. "I thought he was great... he was a friend... he saved Jack's life, he was totally on Mom's side when she was standing by Victor during the trial. It's just that Victor kept lying to Mom... she was begging him to tell her the truth about everything so she wouldn't be blind-sided and he kept leaving stuff out so she ended up being blind-sided anyway. Spencer worked that to his advantage and I think Mom was just such a wreck that she couldn't see which end was up for awhile.

"The thing that got me angry was when we all discovered what the setup was and Mom stayed with Spencer."

Todd was typing furiously on his computer to give himself some supplemental information. "The trial over the death of Margaret Cochran and her unborn child," he read, scanning quickly. "Oh, they weren't dead after all... that was the setup, huh?"

"Right," Starr nodded. "So Victor was innocent but Mom stayed with Spencer anyway and that's when I called her a whore."

"And?"

"And Mom was setting Spencer up," Starr continued. "She was only staying with him because the LPD couldn't get anything concrete on the guy. Mom played along that she was in love with him and wanted to marry him so she could get the goods."

"Did she?"

"Sure did."

Todd kept scanning. "And that's when he tried to rape her?"

"Not exactly," Starr shook her head. "That happened after his trial, after Victor kidnapped and tortured him and Mom went to find Victor and help him but she and Spencer went off the roof. She lost a baby... Victor's baby... and that's when Spencer attacked her, when she was in recovery. Then she developed a heart infection and almost died. She did die, actually," Starr's voice shook. "She flatlined but, somehow, Victor brought her back."

Todd leaned back in his chair, scrubbing at his eyes wearily. There was just so much he had missed. When he focused on Starr again, she had a hesitant look on her face as though she were considering something but wasn't sure she should say it out loud.

She looked so like her mother at that moment that it took Todd's breath away. Even the little crease between Starr's eyes was exactly the same as Blair's when Blair was troubled over something.

"What is it, Shorty?"

Starr looked at her father and chewed her lip. "You're not going to like it."

"I haven't liked most of what I've heard since I got back."

Starr hesitated again and then plowed forward, her words coming in a rush. "You weren't a very good role model for me."

Todd blinked for a few moments.

Starr pressed on. "At the time, you were _easily_ my favorite parent. Far and above Mom. Mom made me go to bed and clean my room. You yelled a lot about other people and always encouraged me to be as awful as I wanted to be. No discipline, no rules, I could do whatever I wanted and I loved that. I had more money than I could ever need and a blatant disregard for anyone other than myself... I could have gotten really hurt on some of my excursions, Dad. Did you ever think that someone would just grab me? Take my money? Hurt me? Kill me?"

Todd's eyes flickered over to Hope. She was still engrossed in her game. "Starr, I never liked how you'd disappear and take cabs all over town without letting me or your mother know."

A slight frown was the response to that. "There were times, Dad, when you didn't care if Mom knew where I was or not. Those times tended to coincide with how wronged you felt by her at the time." She looked down for a moment, her furrowed brow even stormier in countenance. "You told me once that she didn't love me or want me as much as she loved and wanted Max and the baby she was having with him."

Todd sat in stunned silence for a few moments. It was almost shocking the reaction he had to the memory... a wave of self-loathing crashed over him so completely he felt like he was drowning for a moment. "I-I... I never should have said that," he said quietly.

"No, you shouldn't have," Starr agreed. She looked at her daughter, happily playing with her virtual butterflies and felt tears spring in her eyes. "Mom never did that to you. After everything... at the absolute worst moments, she never once said that you didn't love me. Or any of us.

"I know how hard that must have been for her... to have you doing things that broke her heart and then have to look at me, at Jack, at Sam and tell us how much you love us... how much he loves us. I know how hard that is because I have to do it now."

Todd got up from his desk and went around to his daughter, pulling her into his arms, engulfing her tiny frame completely. Starr returned his embrace without hesitation. It was the thing that always made him feel like he had done something right amid all of the havoc he had wreaked. His little Starr never held back from him. "I'm sorry you have to go through this alone, Shorty." He nodded at Hope.

Starr shrugged and wiped her eyes. "I have the best example in the world when it comes to raising a child alone. And anyway, I'm not really alone. I never have been. Mom has been there every step of the way."

"Your Mom knows what it's like to be alone, Starr," Todd said softly. "More so than any of the rest of us. She always wanted to make sure you kids never felt that way."

"She succeeded."

"Mama, can I have a story?" Hope waved the iPad, while still holding it with both hands, on the couch.

"Sure," Starr sat down and tapped away before she apparently got a book for Hope to look at and interact with. Starr adjusted the volume so Hope could hear it but it wouldn't disturb her conversation with Todd. "You know, growing up there were always kids who swore they'd never raise their kids like their parents and others who wanted to do things just like their parents."

"Which one were you?" Todd asked.

"Depended on the day, I guess," Starr smiled. "The thing is, Mom showed me how to be a Mom. I've discovered that I do things the way Mom does. I rethink things now that I'm a Mom. I think about my own childhood and I get why she did some of the things she did... I didn't like some of those things at the time, but I understand it and I appreciate it."

Todd sat back down in his chair and mused silently for a moment. "Your Mom was lying when she told me she was pregnant the first time."

"I know that."

Todd nodded and waved his hand, letting Starr know that he had a point, before he continued. "I made her take a pregnancy test and it turned out that in between getting married and doing what married couples do I had actually gotten the job done. That night... the night we both found out that she really was pregnant, she was all indignant at first, but the next day..." he trailed off, remembering Blair standing in her robe looking out the window. "I guess it really hit her. I remember how far off she was, how scared she was all of a sudden. She said it hadn't been real to her until just then, which is true, but she was so scared that she wouldn't be a good mother. She cried on my shoulder and poured her heart out to me," he smiled gently, reminiscing. "And I told her that she would be a great mother because she knew what a mother's love meant. Turns out I was right."

Starr laughed, wiping at her eyes again. "Yeah, you were. I've come too close to losing her a few times to not know what a mother's love means, what having her really means. And when Da-Victor turned on me, Mom was always there. She was unshaken in her devotion and determination to protect me, Jack, Sam..." she dropped her gaze to her lap. "Dad, there are questions I want to ask you... about Tea, about what really happened there."

"Why would you want to to go _there_?" Todd absolutely didn't want to talk about those times. He was certain that Starr would be furious with him for what he had done back then.

"Jack said some things that made me reconsider her."

"Jack did? What did Jack say?"

"That Tea says and does a lot of things that dig at Mom."

Todd nodded his head. "Well, that's true."

"And that she calls me 'Estrella' to twist the knife, so to speak."

"Jack said all of this?" Jack's perceptive nature was impressive to say the least.

"Is he right?"

Todd sighed. "Yeah, I'd say so. Delgado used to call River 'Rio' when she was cuddling up to Andrew for pretty much the same reason, to dig at Cassie."

"Why?"

"Delgado's got issues, Starr," Todd shrugged. "And I don't even know what they are exactly. She lost her mother at a young age but..."

"You'd think that would make her more sympathetic to mothers in general," Starr frowned. "She wasn't very nice to Mom."

"No," Todd agreed. "But then, I wasn't either."

"Why not?"

"Because I'd been through something horrible and I came back and the life I came back to wasn't what I'd left behind and I was angry at the world and most especially the woman I loved because... that's just who I was at the time."

"You've been through something horrible this time, too," Starr pointed out. "And the life you've come back to isn't the one you left behind. Are you still angry at the world? Are you still angry at Mom?"

Todd chose his words carefully. "I'm angry about a lot of things, Starr. And, I'm not going to lie, some of that is anger at your Mom for not recognizing that he wasn't me..."

"She was the absolute _last_ person to believe," Starr interrupted him. "Victor didn't just walk into town, announce he was you and Mom believed him. She _didn't_. She didn't for a long time and when she figured it out, after he and I kept it secret from her for months, she... it wasn't exactly a happy reunion."

"What happened?"

"I don't want to get into that," Starr shook her head. "I just want you to know some things... I love you. I am _so_ happy you're back. I'm so happy you're a part of my life again, and Hope's life and all of our lives. BUT," she gave her father a stern look, "I'm not going to let you punish Mom for these past eight years."

"I don't want to punish your Mom, Starr," Todd replied. "I want to be with her. I want us to be a family the way we were always meant to be."

"Do you really mean that?"

"Absolutely," Todd nodded. "I'm in a unique position in that I've been removed from my own life twice. Everything I did when I came back from Ireland was wrong and I know it was and I'm not repeating that. My love for your mother and for you and your brother kept me alive during eight years of misery... I didn't stay alive so I could come back and hurt the very woman who made it possible for me to survive."

"So," Starr hedged. "No putting her in jail?"

"Nope."

"No stealing kids?"

"No."

"No bullcrap proposals?"

Todd laughed. "You know, Starr, I was able to get your mother to fall in love with me long before you were a twinkle in my eye. Besides, she loves me now, that's not the problem."

"Trust is," Starr confirmed.

"Yes, well, I'm working on that."

"Dad," Starr's skeptical expression was so apparent it was practically its own entity.

"Knock it off, Shorty," Todd grinned. "I know what I'm doing."

"Is that so?"

"Yes," he mimicked her tone. "I understand your mother better than anyone. I know _exactly_ what I'm doing."

"What?"

"Forget it," he laughed. "I'm not spoiling the surprise."


	30. Chapter 30

Capricorn's stage was dark with only one spotlight illuminating the microphone. Blair came out wearing a black column dress with minimal beading that seemed to curve the light around her rather then bounce off her.. There was only her piano player there to accompany her and he played a couple of chords to begin only to stop as Blair began to sing:

_Love hurts, love scars_

Her voice was quiet and subdued. The club seemed to go silent as well.

_Love wounds, and marks_

_Any heart, not tough_

_Or strong enough_

_To take a lot of pain_

_Take a lot of pain_

_Love is like a cloud_

_Holds a lot of rain_

There was a haunting starkness to the performance. The musical accompaniment was minimal, a chord here, a chord there, while Blair's voice was the absolute focus. Her voice was strong but stark and filled the words with depth and emotion that came from her core.

_I'm young, I know_

_But even so_

_I know a thing or two_

_I learned, from you_

_I really learned a lot_

_Really learned a lot_

_Love is like a stove_

_It burns you when it's hot_

Todd felt hypnotized as he watched her. He wasn't aware of anything else except her and the words that she sang.

_Some fools think of happiness_

_Blissfulness, togetherness_

_Some fools fool themselves I guess_

_They're not foolin' me_

_I know it isn't true_

_I know it isn't true_

_Love is just a lie_

_Made to make you blue_

Her voice was raw and real. The words she sang coming from someplace inside of her that she rarely showed. Todd remembered telling her that love was a lie once and hearing the words come from her, the emotions on her face as real as the emotion in her voice, cut him to his soul.

Did she really believe this?

_Love hurts_

Blair finished the song to absolute silence. After a moment, she walked off the stage.

Todd placed his hand to his chest and drew it back to look at it. He was honestly surprised that he wasn't bleeding. Blair's raw performance felt like slashes of a knife at his very soul. He looked around and saw that the rest of the audience was equally stunned.

Were they staring at him? Did they know that he was the reason she sang a song about the pain and anguish of love? They must. Why else would she sing it?

A smattering of applause started at one side of the club. Blair had come out from backstage and the patrons took the opportunity to show their admiration for her performance. The applause spread from the tables near where she came out across the room and soon everyone in the club was on their feet, applauding and whistling.

Blair's smile was almost as blinding as a spotlight. She accepted the accolades gracefully and gratefully.

Todd stared at the table top. He had been trying so hard to show her how things were different and it was all for nothing. Obviously, she didn't believe in him at all or she wouldn't have chosen that song to sing. What was it going to take?

He stood up abruptly, scanning the club to where the crowd was thickest and stalked over to plant himself in front of Blair.

She turned to him with a smile.

"Can we talk?"

Blair extricated herself from the group of people that surrounded her and gestured towards her office.

Once they were inside and the door was closed, Todd rounded on her. "Is that what you think of me?"

"What?"

"All of this time, Blair," Todd paced back and forth across the office in agitation. "All of this time I've been back I've been trying to show you that I'm not... I'm not that person anymore! And you get up and sing a whole fucking song about how much I've hurt you? What the hell?!"

He finally turned to face her only see that crease between her brows and a hollow look on her face.

Blair leaned back against the door of her office, closed her eyes and sighed. "Why does this have to be about you?"

Todd got the distinct feeling he had stepped in it but good.

"Why does _any_ of this have to be about _you_?" Blair asked again. "It was a song, Todd. Yes, it's a sad song about pain and, you know what? I've got a lot of that and it's not _all_ centered around you. I had pain and loss before I ever _met_ you, before I had ever _heard_ of you and I've been hurt by plenty of people that _aren't_ you." She sighed. "I have a lot going on and this... _that_..." she waved one hand to gesture out to the main floor of the club, "is a way for me to let go of things.

"I don't know if you noticed this, but people really liked my performance tonight. I was able to channel a lot of hurt into something good... something that was maybe a little bit meaningful and profound. I'm allowed to do that. I'm allowed to _have_ that."

She turned and grasped the knob of the door before leveling a hard look at Todd. "You're not the only one who has a right to be angry, Todd."

Todd watched her sweep out of the office and then exhaled loudly, letting his head tilt back until he was gazing at the ceiling. She had been smiling when he approached her and he had taken that smile away. She had been enjoying the patrons of her club congratulating her on her performance and he had stepped in and taken something she had done and made it about him.

"Some things never change, huh, Manning?"

Maybe that was a good thing. He wasn't a completely different person after all no matter how much soul searching he was able to do during his eight years of imprisonment.

The thing he could do now was go back out there and wait. And watch. He was good at that. He needed to pay better attention and not let himself get blinded by his own old crap because when he let that happen, everything went wrong.

* * *

"Still not talking to your mother?"

Dani looked up to see Victor peering in through the crack of her very slightly opened door. She turned back to her phone and texted Destiny with a 'GTG BBL' before sitting up and waiting for him to come in.

He did so, taking a seat on her bed as well.

They sat in silence for a moment before Danielle spoke up. "I am so angry at her."

"Angrier than when you first found out about me?"

"Which time?" Dani shrugged. "When we all thought you were Todd and I hated the fact that my father was actually a rapist or when I found out you weren't Todd at all and the guy that I had accepted as my second father wasn't actually my father?"

"Pick one," Victor said. "You were angry enough about me the first time that you wanted to shoot me."

"And instead, my real father got shot," Dani's face crumpled slightly. "My Dad is dead because of Mom."

"Eli killed Ross, Dani," Victor reminded her.

"Which would never have happened if Mom had decided that I had to be Todd Manning's daughter and ripped me away from him... making him desperate enough to call up his long lost psychotic brother!" Dani scowled fiercely. "All Dad wanted was to be with me again but Mom wanted you... or Todd... or _whoever_ and there was nothing that was going to get in her way. Certainly not me!"

"Yeah, your mother tends to get laser focused on things."

"I miss him," Dani mourned. "I missed him when she hid me away from him, I missed him the whole time I was here and I miss him now. And, as it turns out, I'm not even Todd's! So all of it was for nothing! My Dad died for _nothing_!"

"Well," Victor sighed. He stroked her hair the way he had always seen Blair stroke Starr's. "I can understand how upset you are... but I'm still happy you're in my life."

She gave him a hesitant smile.

"I know I'm not your real father," Victor continued. "But I have to admit that I'm glad you're not Todd's. I don't have to share you with him now."

"As opposed to what?" Dani demanded. "Starr and Jack and Sam? Who you _do_ have to share?"

Victor wasn't going to start in on exactly how complicated his own thoughts were about those three kids. He was still struggling with how far away his feelings were from his life as Todd. But there was nothing complicated about Dani and he wanted her to know that. "Let's just focus on you. Todd never knew you so I got to know you without anything of him involved. Everything that grew between you and your mother and me... wasn't him. It was me. I know you have a lot of complicated feelings about Ross and Tea and me... but, to me, you're my daughter and I love you and I always will."

Dani leaned against him and he tucked his arm around her shoulders, squeezing her gently. She had to admit that having Victor made things easier. In a way, they shared a similar circumstance. Everything she thought she knew about her life had been severely altered, twice now. And he had had his whole life ripped away.

And she still thought of him as her new father.

But she was still angry as hell at her mother.

"The three of us are a family," Victor murmured, resting his chin on the top of her head. "And we're going to get through all of this and figure it all out. You go ahead and be mad at your mom for now but you remember that we're in all of this together."

"Whatever."

Victor snorted. "So about Jack's birthday..."

Dani groaned. "I don't have to go, do I? Jack's not even my brother anymore. And he's annoying."

"I think if you have something super important to do with Destiny that could come first," Victor agreed. "I'm going and I would imagine your mother is coming as well. Although, I bet if you told her you wanted to spend some mother/daughter time with her she'd jump at that."

"Don't get ahead of yourself," Dani shot him a sullen glare.

He grinned and kissed the top of her head. "You two are going to have to have a talk. You're going to have to figure out a way to deal with this and put it behind you."

"Not any time soon."

"Danielle," Victor said sternly. "She's your mother. Remember that." He chucked her on the chin and left her alone.

* * *

Blair's smile didn't quite reach her eyes and he was responsible for that. Todd spent the next couple of hours watching her as she made her way through Capricorn mingling with the patrons. She did not join him at his table the way she usually did.

He supposed he couldn't blame her.

She had sung a heartbreaking song and left a crowd of people in stunned, awed silence and he had made it all about his issues. She'd been right about that.

It had only been a matter of days when she had let some of that pain out and he had held her in his arms and been there for her. Now he was basically shitting all over her own attempts to deal with her life her own way.

Blair's staff avoided him even when it came to cleaning up after the last of the customers and locking the door. They had become accustomed to his presence there and knew that he would stay and leave with Blair. Their seemed to be some uncertainty, though, as Blair wasn't being particularly friendly with him as they went about their after hours business.

In fact, Blair was sitting at the bar. Drinking.

When he realized the place was empty save for himself, Blair and the remains of the staff, Todd approached her.

She was drinking scotch. She was obviously upset. "Tim, you're going to have to call me a cab in a few minutes," she told her bartender.

"I'll take you home," Todd said quietly, resting the tips of his fingers on her arm.

She snarled at him. "I'd rather you not."

"Blair..." Todd sighed and sat down on the barstool next to her. "I'm sorry."

"Save it."

"You really were amazing," Todd plowed ahead. "That song... was incredible. You really laid it all out there on that stage and... I guess I just automatically think of the things I've done to hurt you. The way you looked and the way you sounded, I've seen that and heard that a few too many times because of things I've done."

She didn't answer for a few moments; she just stared straight ahead sipping her scotch. "I... I don't allow myself to think about what you've gone through these past eight years."

Todd blinked, surprised that she would even bring it up. "Okay. Why?"

"Because when I do think about it, it just about kills me. To know what you went through, for so long, while we didn't have any idea. To go through so much pain..." she sighed. "Maybe, if my singing hurts you, you shouldn't come here anymore."

"Don't say that."

"I don't want to hurt you, Todd," she whispered, casting a mournful look at him. "You've been hurt enough. And this," she pointed at the stage, "is the only outlet I have. I need it but I can't do it if you're here and my songs hurt you. I can't."

"Okay, okay," he grabbed her hand in both of his and enclosed it before pressing his lips against her fingertips. "You..." he thought for a moment. "You have to know that not hearing you sing would hurt more."

"Todd..."

"And, maybe, just maybe, we can find you another way to get all that crap out. When did you start internalizing all of this stuff anyway?"

"When didn't I?"

"You didn't _always_ do it," Todd pointed out. "You used to lash out at people plenty."

"You can't lash out at the dead," Blair replied dully.

_Well, that was morbid_. "What do you mean?"

"Spencer's dead. Margaret Cochrane is dead. Eli's dead. Sam's dead. Luna's dead," she took another drink. "Asa's dead. Max is gone."

"Delgado's still around."

Blair huffed out a humorless laugh. "I made peace with Tea because she was dying, too. We all thought she was dead for a time."

"Well, she's not dead now and why did that stop you anyway?"

"Big bad Blair picking on the dying woman? Please."

"She would have done it to you."

Blair snatched her hand away from Todd and turned on him fiercely. "I'm not Tea!"

"No, you're not," Todd couldn't help the smile that spread across his face. "You have no idea how happy that makes me."

She tossed him a skeptical look.

Todd sighed and then turned Blair's barstool so she was facing him. "I used to dream of a burning world; of blackened skies choked with smoke and acid. I'd stand and look out over the fields of fire and wreckage and then I'd look to my side. Tea would be standing next to me and I'd tell her, 'I did this all for you. Is this enough?' And she wouldn't even look at me. She'd feast on what I'd done and then say 'No, it's never enough. Do more.'

"That was my life with her. It was short-lived but it was _epic_ in it's misery. And nothing would ever be enough because, when it came down to it, I was never willing to give her everything. But even if I was willing, even if I did give her everything, it wouldn't have mattered. I came back from that misery and I wanted you... I wouldn't say so at first, I'm not even sure I realized _why_ I wanted you back at the time. I just knew that if I had you things would be better.

"It took awhile for me to realize I didn't just want you in a 'get back all the things I had' kind of way. I wanted you in _every_ way. I wanted you for love even if a part of me insisted that it wasn't real. I told you once it was you and me against the world and you said you didn't have anything against the world. That's you, Blair. You are the person that makes me look at the world and want to live _in_ it rather than destroy it.

"Everything I have in my life that is good, is because I've loved you, Blair. I wouldn't trade that for the world. Sing as many sad songs as you want," he leaned towards her earnestly. "If they hurt me, I'd rather take it from you than anyone else."

"Masochist," she muttered, but there was a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth and her eyes were wet.

"Only for you," Todd touched her arm again. "Now will you let me take you home? Please?"

"All right," Blair fetched her coat and purse and Todd got her into the car quickly.

"I still think we need to find another outlet for you," he said as they drove out of town towards Dorian's. "You know, some people release stress by just screaming a couple of times."

"If I start screaming," Blair sighed, her head lolling against the back of the seat. "I'll never stop."

He reached over and took her hand, squeezing it gently. The scotch had obviously hit her. She was quiet and almost motionless and he held her hand the whole way back to Dorian's. Todd recognized the same thing in Blair that he saw in himself... the way she kept everything and buried it deep inside until it burst out like a firestorm. Blair was more practiced it keeping it all covered up than he was.

Blair's rage came out in short, concentrated bursts. She was usually so completely transformed by it that she went crazy or got strangely violent... which usually resulted in more of that turned in on herself.

He would never have asked to be imprisoned and tortured for eight years but there was a catharsis in how he dealt with things while he was there. He was either able to shriek out his pain and misery during torture or able to completely separate himself and retreat to a place no one could touch him.

Blair just covered up her pain. As a result, she was like a walking infection... all of that hurt and pain festering inside of her and turning into more hurt and pain until she didn't know anything else. Until it drove her mad and made her incapable of seeing the light again.

She was breathing steadily, deeply and Todd realized she was grabbing a quick alcohol induced nap on the drive home.

"I love you," he whispered to her. "I'm here and you're safe. I promise you, you're safe."


	31. Chapter 31

"Tell me about Araby again," Jack asked.

He and Blair were grooming their horses in preparation for their ride together. Blair's red chestnut gelding shook his head and snorted as she put her weight into the brush. He looked very pleased with himself as Blair exclaimed over the condition of his muddy coat.

Jack's gelding, a dark bay with three white socks and a snip on his nose, heaved a sigh as Jack brushed his hind-quarters.

"Araby was a birthday present," Blair said. "A beautiful, black Arabian stallion, mostly untamed. Your father bought him for me."

Jack grunted slightly. "I mean _him_, not what he was and who bought him."

"Araby loved apples and carrots and could ferret out pills like a bloodhound. You had to bury those things in a half pound of molasses before he'd eat them. He loved splashing in the creek during the summer and he was an absolute whore of a horse when it came to brushing. He'd lean up against you when you brushed him and I'd swear you could hear him sigh with delight. And as soon as I'd let him out into the pasture he'd go and roll in the biggest mud puddle he could find so he could get brushed again."

"How long was he at that stud farm?"

"About eight years," Blair smiled. "Living the life of a very valuable and spoiled stallion. His babies have made names for themselves in the show circuits. And his sons are proving themselves to be good stallions, too."

"I wish I'd gotten to see him in person."

"I know," Blair sighed. "I should have set aside the time and made the trip. We could have driven down to Virginia and seen him in all of his glory. I'm sorry about that."

"We do this," Jack pointed out. "This is nice."

"Usually, it's girls who like horses," Blair said as they led their now saddled mounts out of the stable and into the courtyard. "I was so disappointed when Starr couldn't have cared less about them. I'm so glad you took after me in that regard. Now we have something that's just for us."

Jack mounted his horse and waited for his mother to do the same. It was very early and they were the only people on the trails. Jack smiled as they broke into a trot. This was the start of a good birthday.

* * *

"Good morning," Todd chirped happily as he sat down at the table.

Several forks hung frozen in mid-air as everyone stared at him in shock.

"What's going on? What's happening?" Natalie asked under breath.

"I'm having breakfast with all of you," Todd replied merrily. "And I want to discuss some business."

The table was heavily populated. Viki, Clint, Cord, Tina, Jessica, Brody and Natalie were all in attendance. It was a scene that Todd usually avoided or breezed through to make fun of, presuming he was up and moving at all. His late nights at Capricorn didn't lend themselves to early mornings and Buchanans, it seemed, thrived on the adage of 'early to bed; early to rise.' He understood it in the case of Viki and Clint; they were old. Jessica and Brody had a little brood of kids to deal with. They had moved into the carriage house for more room but they always came for breakfast. And Natalie had an infant of her own with sporadic assistance from John. John didn't seem to be a morning person, either. Todd rarely saw him in the morning and if he did, he felt that John had probably been up all night anyway.

Bree and the babies could be heard in the living room with Lois.

"Business?" Cord and Clint said in unison. Clint looked suspicious while Cord looked curious.

Todd found himself thinking Cord really was a good guy and Clint had been once as well. He wondered if it was in Cord's future to end up as suspicious and angry as Clint. He discovered, much to his surprise, that he hoped it wouldn't end that way for Cord.

"Yes. Business. B-u-s-i-"

"I know how to spell business, Manning," Clint barked.

"Well, you looked like you didn't know what I was talking about."

"What sort of business, Uncle Todd?" Jessica asked.

He was glad Jess had decided to take part in this. He was counting on her. He was, weirdly, counting on Natalie, too. There was a strange sense of justice in her that he could only assume came from Viki. "Well, I found this the other night." He slapped the BE business plan on the table with a thud.

"Where did you get that?" Clint demanded as soon as he realized what it was. "Have you been poking through my personal matters?"

"It was shoved in a chair in the library," Todd said blandly, filling his plate with eggs, bacon and home fries. "I'm pretty sure that chair doesn't count as your specific personal matters. As for reading it, I was bored. Keep track of your shit better."

"Language, Todd," Viki sighed. She was giving him a stern glare as if she wasn't sure where he was going and definitely not sure she liked it.

"Anyway, I read it. It was as boring as I thought it would be except for one thing." He flipped through the paperwork and then handed it to Jessica pointing at the thing he was referring to.

Natalie leaned over to read over her twin's arm.

"Daimler Designs," they read in unison. They both looked at Todd curiously.

Clint, Viki, Tina and Cord knew immediately what that meant. Brody had no idea so he remained quiet and observant but it was clear he noticed the expressions on the other's faces. Natalie had no idea either, but Jessica did. It took a moment for it to dawn on her.

"Wait... didn't Blair used to call herself Daimler?"

"Yes," the word trickled around the table.

"Oh," Natalie nodded but then her brow furrowed. "Okay, I don't get it. What is this? Did she sell a business to BE?"

"No," Clint snapped. "She did not."

"Asa took it from her when he divorced her," Tina supplied.

"What was it?" Jessica asked.

"A jewelry design company," Viki explained. "She was very good. She had a real talent for it."

"I didn't know that," Natalie said. "All I've known is... she had that magazine for awhile and now runs Capricorn. I didn't know she did anything else."

"Blair built up a company of her own from scratch a long time ago," Cord said loyally.

"Until she ran it into the ground," Tina piped up.

"_Dorian_ did that," Todd corrected. "When Starr was sick, dying of aplastic anemia," he made sure to remind everyone, particularly Tina, exactly why Blair gave up her company, "Blair signed Melador over to Dorian to take care of so she could focus on her daughter. Dorian's the one who didn't give a crap about it enough to take care of it." His words were pointed. He wasn't going to let anyone think that Blair was a lousy businesswoman. She was terrific.

"She does an amazing job with Capricorn," Natalie admitted. "Antonio did okay with it but when she bought it she really turned things around. She's gotten big names there, she's even got her own little cult following."

"I didn't know she designed jewelry, though," Jessica continued.

"She lived on it," Todd said quietly. "When she was young, still getting handed over from foster home to foster home, she learned how to make earrings and necklaces. She'd store them up and then run away and she'd sell the jewelry to live off of before the authorities caught up to her and dragged her back to whatever hole she was stuck in. She'd start all over again. She had to learn how to make the pieces in secret, too. But she'd get another store together and make another break for it.

"She got better each time, smarter, too. Every time she ran away she was able to stay away longer."

"God," Natalie breathed. "I had no idea."

"Not many people do," Todd said. He didn't like telling tales about Blair out of school. The stories she told him about her foster homes were stories she had confided in him because she had trusted him and he didn't want to repeat them. He knew that she had never told him the worst of it, however, and the only reason he was telling the people at this table about these things now was because it was part of a grander operation.

He wanted Daimler Designs. He wanted it back from Buchanan Enterprises and he was going to play every trick he had available at his disposal to get it. The best course of action was to play on sympathy, especially to Jessica who was already a soft sell and Natalie who knew very well what it was to be alone and have to fight to survive. They would be the key to get Clint to hand it over. Todd suspected that Cord would be willing to do so as well.

"So how did BE get it?" Natalie's brow furrowed. "Grampa took it?"

"When he divorced Blair," Clint said. "Pa made sure that he took back what was his."

"Daimler Designs wasn't his," Todd replied.

"He funded it," Clint snapped. "He paid for it, it belonged to him."

"And he never did anything with it," Todd pointed out. "I've checked. He took control of the company and then he let it wither and die because he knew that it meant something to Blair. BE hasn't made a damn penny from Daimler Designs. He took it and buried it because he had the money and the power and he wanted to hurt Blair."

"Wait a minute," Jessica got up from the table and left the room briefly, returning with her iPad. She made a few quick movements to connect to her BE computer before Natalie took it and ran a quick report.

"It's true," she nodded as she and Jessica peered at the screen. "BE has never made a cent on the company. It's never been used at all." She frowned and then looked at Todd. "So what do you want?"

"I want Daimler Designs."

"You're not a jewelry designer."

Todd sighed and squirmed slightly. "Blair's birthday is coming up," he mumbled.

Jessica, Natalie and Viki's faces immediately softened. "Oh, Uncle Todd that is so sweet!" Jessica smiled. "You want to give her her first company back for her birthday!"

"The first birthday you're spending with her since you've come back," Viki concluded.

Well, he hadn't exactly been expecting that response. Everyone at the table, save for Clint and Tina, were looking at him with various expressions of approval. It was bizarre.

"Well, I don't see what the problem is," Jessica said matter of factly. "I think it's a great idea. BE isn't using it and clearly never intended to. I didn't even know we had the company until just now anyway."

"Are you making an offer?" Clint said brusquely.

"I shouldn't have to," Todd replied. "Asa took it because of things between him and Blair. You don't have those issues with her."

"I'm still a business man," Clint told him.

"Dad, don't," Jessica rolled her eyes. "It's dead-weight and if we just sign over the property then it doesn't require a meeting of the board members."

"Asa would never sign over the company to Todd," Clint insisted.

"Asa's dead," Cord's voice was soft. "And I don't recall seeing anything in his will requiring that we hold onto his hatred of Blair. It's certainly not something I'd do anyway."

"Does Blair even remember she had this company?" Tina asked pointedly.

Todd glared at his sister, his jaw clenching. Leave it to her to want to continue sticking it to Blair. "Blair most likely gave it up as a lost cause ages ago."

"Oh my God," Natalie's eyes widened as she continued looking at the screen. "This is just beyond petty... look... Grampa made sure all of her designs fell under the DD name before they were made into jewelry and then had, on file, an intellectual property injunction just in case she ever made anything that was like any of her own designs so he could not only sue her for poaching her own work but he could take anything new she created."

"And she wasn't allowed to make any jewelry for... seven years?" Jessica read aloud. "Dad... sign over the company. We don't use it. We don't even want it. This... was just mean."

Todd smiled slightly. She had made him a ring and a chain despite Asa's injunctions. He supposed since they were gifts that didn't make her any money she could get away with it. Still, despite Asa's power play she had cared about him enough to create those for him. His own love for her soared even higher.

"Well, that was Asa when he got his dander up," Cord sighed as the conversation around the table continued.

"He had a good reason for hating that woman," Clint insisted.

"We don't," Jessica replied curtly. "Blair has been very nice to me when she had no reason to be. I've attacked her during my own mental health crises and she helped me. God, I stole her granddaughter and she's never held that against me! Give Todd the company, Dad!"

Jessica's pleas peppered with the reminders of the damage she had done during her own problems caused Clint to cave. He nodded and even shook Todd's hand in front of everyone as a show of good faith and promised to call in and have all of the paperwork taken care of on Monday.

Cord, Jessica and Natalie all promised to make sure it was handled.

"If anyone breathes a word of this to Blair..." Todd threatened.

"We won't," Viki promised. She looked at Tina pointedly.

Tina didn't say anything until Cord sent an elbow into her side. "Okay! I won't say anything!"

There was a pause as they all stared at her.

She held up her hand. "I swear I won't say anything!"

Todd had to be content with that. "I've got to go meet Jack and Blair at the stables. We're going car shopping."

"I'll see you at the house later," Viki said with a gentle smile. "I'm not going to miss his birthday."

"Would he even want the rest of us there?" Jessica asked.

"He's got the whole soccer team coming over," Todd told her. "Starr's not even going to be there. She took Hope and Sam and her boyfriend into Philadelphia to go to the aquarium. You can stop in if you want but I wouldn't be surprised if you barely saw him."

Jessica got up to walk him to the door. "This really is an amazing present you're getting for Blair."

"Make sure all the paperwork is in her name," Todd asked her. "I don't want my name on it. I want hers. It's her company and always was."

"Are things going okay for you two?"

Todd's hand paused on the door knob. He stared at it for a moment. "I don't think anyone knows just how much Blair's been hurt."

He glanced at Jessica who nodded. "She keeps things pretty close to the vest."

"I'd like you to tell me about stealing my granddaughter."

Jessica sighed softly. "That would probably be a good idea."

"But today my son turns sixteen and his mother and I are going to buy him a car and throw him a party and that comes first."

"It should," Jessica smiled and hugged him.

* * *

When the taxi dropped Todd off at the country club, Blair and Jack were feeding carrots to their horses who were snug in their stalls again. Their cheeks were colored from the cool autumn day and the exertion of their ride and their eyes were bright.

They were sharing jokes when he approached them.

"You look like you had a good ride together."

"We did," Blair grinned, ruffling her son's hair. "Now it's time for a different kind of ride."

"Are you buying me a car?" Jack asked excitedly.

Blair pursed her lips together teasingly.

"MOM!" Jack pounced on her. "Are you?"

"Your father and I are," she told him.

Jack leapt into the air with a whoop. "Let's go!" He turned and sprinted to the car.

"You do realize you're getting all of the credit for this, right?" Todd couldn't keep the sullen tone out of his voice.

"Todd, really," Blair tucked her hand in his arm. "You are a part of this memory for him. He may not acknowledge it right now but when he remembers this day, he's going to remember you being here. That's huge."

"Yeah, I guess so."

"Hey," she said teasingly. "You were Starr's absolute favorite parent. Now you know what it feels like to be the odd man out. Deal with it."

"So this is revenge, is it?"

"No," her tone turned serious. "This is you and me, together, making our son's birthday something special. Now, get in the back. The birthday boy gets shotgun."

* * *

"I'm going to need you to drive my car back to Dorian's and play host before Jack and I get back," Blair said as Jack was getting the rundown of all of the technological wonders of his new car.

"Why?" Todd asked.

"I have one more surprise for him."

"What is it?"

Blair's face was lit with excitement. So much so that it made Todd particularly suspicious. Blair had something going on and it was big. "I'm not telling you. Not yet."

"Why?"

"Because I want Jack to know first."

"Blair..." Todd sighed.

She held up her hand to stop him. "I have always wanted Jack to be the first to find out about this and tonight, after the party and when Starr and the little ones get back, I'm going to let him tell everyone. Including you."

"Really?"

"This is Jack's day," she said. "You don't know how close I came to losing my beautiful boy, Todd... but he's coming back. He's coming back and I know,_ I know_, that you two are going to come together as father and son. I believe that with everything in me."

It was strange that she could be so confident and optimistic about that but utterly drained and defeatist when it came to her own life with him. Blair always was a little off, it was one of her most charming traits as far as he was concerned.

"What's so funny?"

Todd realized he had a stupid grin on his face. "Nothing. You really want me to play host?"

"Well," she hedged. "Cassie will be there to oversee things."

Cassie hadn't been back too long and Blair hadn't warned him when he helped her into the house after she had a few too many at Capricorn the other night. Still, as far as the Cramer Coven went, Cassie was the one he liked best other than Blair and Addie. Cassie treated him kindly and hadn't immediately accused him of anything nefarious the way Dorian surely would have if she had been living at Wicked Witch Central.

"And I'm going to find out what this big secret is tonight?"

"Absolutely," she noticed Jack taking pictures of his new car with his phone and decided he was ready to go. "I'll see you back at Dorian's."

Todd went to her car and started it. As he headed out of the car lot, he realized that when Blair referred to home these days she actually referred to it as Dorian's more often than not.

He wondered about that.

* * *

Jack watched his mother unlock a sturdy service door on one side of the Capricorn building and wondered what was going on. "So..." he hedged as she opened the door and gestured him inside. "Another surprise?"

"Yep," she nodded. She activated the elevator with a key card and when they were inside, she actually used a thumb pad to activate it again.

"Are you a member of SHIELD?" Jack asked.

"What?"

"I've been watching too many Avengers cartoons with Sam," he muttered.

Blair just grinned and waited for the doors to open. They stepped into a foyer that hadn't been decorated to an impressive set of doors. Blair used another key card and thumb imprint to open the doors and stepped aside so Jack could enter.

Jack almost tripped over his own feet when he went inside.

The place wasn't decorated but it was clearly a home. The view from the doorway was a large, two story entryway that spread out into an open living space. A chandelier with crystals of several colors hung above a stairway that curved up the space and bridged across from one side to the other, disappearing into dark hallways that, presumably, led to bedrooms.

There was a wall of windows on the other side of the space that looked out over downtown Llanview. The river could be seen sparkling in the autumn sun on the other side of Riverside Park.

"Holy crap, Mom!" Jack exclaimed turning in circles to take it all in. "What is this place?"

"This," Blair said softly, "is our new home."


	32. Chapter 32

By the time Jack and Blair returned to La Boulie, they were well into a discussion of exactly what he wanted in his room and negotiating whether or not it would actually come to pass. She swore him to secrecy until after the party when he could make the announcement.

Jack was thrilled to be the one sharing a secret. And, in this case, it was a good secret for a change. He felt like part of the family unit again and he attributed that to his mother. He and Blair had always shared a close relationship. He supposed his rebellious streak wound up being a bit on the expected side because he basically did exactly what his sister had done, deny their mother and ally completely with their father.

Jack wondered if Starr knew just what she had missed by making those choices. He suspected after the Never-Ending Drama of her pregnancy she clued in.

A brace of young bucks was gathered in the foyer when Blair and Jack got back. Cassie was just telling them that everything was set up for them in the basement when they got a load of their teammate and birthday boy. They all boisterously wished him a happy birthday, some accompanied with friendly punches on the arm and then several of them straightened up when they saw Blair.

"Hi, Ms. Cramer," was the scattered greeting.

"Boys," Blair nodded as she shucked her coat.

Todd plowed through the group of boys and took Blair's coat, standing close enough to her to be territorial. For good measure, he leaned forward and gave her a peck on the cheek before hanging up her coat in the closet.

"I smell horses," a tall, willowy, chocolate-skinned young man with an English accent spoke up, leaning towards Jack and sniffing.

"We went riding," Jack nodded.

Another boy, built more along the lines of a bulldog, leaned over and sniffed as well. "I smell new car!"

Jack grinned.

The group whooped loudly and wanted to see the new wheels.

"No driving!" Blair bellowed as they all tumbled out of the front door to admire the new vehicle.

"I have nothing but admiration for you, Blair," Cassie sighed. "Taking on an entire team of high school boys? Do you have a tazer by any chance?"

"They'll be fine," Blair flipped her hair over her shoulder. "Pizza, soda, video games, they'll be happy as can be."

"Viki is entertaining Victor and Tea in the kitchen," Cassie said.

"Oh good," Blair went into say hello.

Tea was not looking her best. She had a pinched expression on her face and dark circles under her eyes. Victor looked downright pleasant as he chatted amiably with Viki about personal journeys. He was teasing his sister about 'finding himself' in a place like Paris, Texas.

"But not there," Victor was helping himself to some chips and salsa. "Maybe London, Montana. Or Berlin, New Mexico. Maybe Tokyo, Vermont."

Viki seemed amused in spite of herself.

"Hello, hello," Blair breezed in with a greeting.

"Where's the birthday boy?" Victor asked.

"Showing off his new ride to his team."

"You got him a car?" Tea frowned.

"Yes," Todd and Blair said in unison.

"He's sixteen," Victor nodded. "We did the same thing for Starr."

Todd's jaw clenched at having missed his daughter's sixteenth birthday and knowing that his imposter was the one who was there instead. "Didn't you say that you guys forgot Starr's birthday?"

"We were looking for Sam," Victor replied tightly. "Who had been kidnapped. Starr understood."

Sensing the rising tension, Blair cut in. "This is Jack's birthday," her voice was fierce. "This is about Jack. If this is going to turn into a goddamn pissing match I am turning the hose on every single person in this room. Sorry, Viki... collateral damage."

Viki's eyebrows were somewhere near her hairline and she didn't seem to know exactly how to respond to Blair's impassioned threat.

Tea scowled. Victor looked vastly amused by Blair and possibly a little impressed.

Todd was thinking it was a glimmer of his kickass Blair that he hadn't seen in awhile.

"Been awhile since you got all fiery like that," Victor said with a leer.

"Shut up," Blair tossed at him. "I'm going to go herd the boys downstairs."

Cassie joined in Viki and Victor's casual chat and Tea took the opportunity to sidle closer to Todd.

"Well," she said quietly. "You must be relieved."

Todd looked at her blankly.

"Daniella not being yours."

"Don't do this, Delgado."

"Don't do what?" Tea asked. "I know you're happy she's not yours."

Todd retreated to the other side of the kitchen. "What do you want me to say?"

Tea stared at him. She wanted him to be sorry. She wanted him to say he wanted to have a child with her so she could know that he wanted a part of her with him. Or so she could rebuff him completely and say how happy she was that Dani wasn't his.

"You know why I left that island, Delgado."

She looked across the room at Victor longingly. Victor had told her what she wanted to hear. That Todd had left because he was happy and because he was afraid of that happiness.

Todd caught her look and frowned. "What story did _he_ tell you?"

Tea felt more and more miserable. She wanted so much to let go. She had spent so much time trying to get this man to love her and every time she tried to corner him he cut her off completely. She had a man who did love her and wanted a life with her. She had a man who chose her over Blair, which is what she had wanted for so long. Why was she still obsessing about Todd and his lack of interest? Was it just about winning? "He said you left because you were afraid of being happy. With me."

The incredulous look on Todd's face gave way to irritation. "I crossed an ocean on a homemade raft," he hissed. "I was scared to death to do that. I thought I would die. I came close to dying any number of times. Why in the hell would anyone risk their life, repeatedly, to get away from happiness?"

Of course Tea knew that. She had known it all along. She had known it when she woke up to find Todd hunched over the cooler with his back to her, gazing at the picture of Blair and thinking he was hiding it from her. When Victor, as Todd, had told her that he had really wanted to stay with her because she made him so happy that it scared him, she latched onto it because she wanted it to be true. She wanted to be the one he chose.

"I needed to get back to Blair," Todd whispered heatedly. "I needed to get back to my kids. I needed my family. You already know this and you already know how I feel about having different kids with different mothers. You don't want me to say it out loud so don't come up to me demanding answers you really don't want to hear."

Blair came back in at that point and began getting two liter bottles of soda out of the fridge. She shoved two into Tea's arms, giving the other woman a severe look as if she knew what the topic of conversation was, then turned and shoved two bowls of chips at Victor. "Go downstairs and set these out for the boys. Jack wanted to see you today," she leveled a look at Victor. "So go down and wish him a happy birthday."

"Yes ma'am," Victor did as he was told with Tea following him.

Blair gave Cassie a package of plastic cups and nudged her after them. Viki took some paper plates and napkins without prompting and followed.

When they were alone, Blair looked at Todd. "Tea didn't look too happy."

"When does she ever look happy?" He noted that Blair was getting more bowls of snacks ready and went to the refrigerator to get more soda out.

"Is it possible to not have the heavy discussions today?"

"I would love that," Todd sighed. "Really. I already apologized to Delgado for how I treated her during our relationship but she keeps coming after me and demanding... I don't even _know_ what. It's like she wants me to hurt her!"

"Does that surprise you?"

Todd blinked. He hadn't ever considered that Blair might have realized that his relationship with Tea was a deeply masochistic one. He had always rather hoped that Blair never saw just how broken he was back then.

"You and Tea are probably going to need to have a conversation," Blair said quietly. "Not today but soon."

"Why?"

"To put things to rest," Blair shrugged, gathering the snacks. "To settle things."

"There isn't anything to settle, Blair."

"You want that to be true," she said over her shoulder. "Because you don't want to deal with it. I can't say I blame you and maybe there isn't anything to settle when all is said and done but you should still talk with her and come to that conclusion together. She's still holding onto something..."

"I can't give her what she wants, babe."

Blair stopped and turned to face him. "What does she want?"

Todd frowned as he considered that.

"You're not sure, either. Like I said, you two need to have a conversation. You should make time for it."

Todd followed Blair down into the basement where Jack's party was set up. The large flat screen television was currently sporting a soccer game that the team was engrossed in and arguing over. As Blair oversaw the arranging of the snacks, the boys drifted over to start helping themselves. A few of them kept their eyes glued to the game but some of the boys graciously thanked their hosts for the food before continuing arguments and discussion about the English Premier League versus La Liga, the merits of various soccer players and who they had to look out for when the season started.

Blair waded through the adolescent crowd and paused the game to get their attention. "We've got the pizzas and wings and stuff ordered so they'll be here soon," she told them. "I'm not expecting this room to be pristine by the end of the day but I will warn everyone here that if things aren't kept to a reasonable level of clean no one leaves here until I am happy with the results. Am I clear?"

"Yes," came the chorus.

Blair unpaused the game and went back upstairs.

Jack seemed completely engrossed in the game and his teammates so Todd and the rest followed Blair back up. Todd was actually happy to see his son in such an environment. He was part of a football team but he wasn't really friends with anyone on the team. He would never have had a party and invited all of his teammates. There was always anger in him when he was a kid; a raging, boiling anger that could and would be set off by any hint of competition from teammates.

This was a different set of circumstances and Todd was happy to see Jack in a place that was much healthier than his own childhood was.

When the pizza and wings arrived, Blair sent Victor and Todd down to distribute the food and then she nudged Tea into the living room.

"All right," Blair sat down next to her on the couch. "How are you doing?"

"Dani isn't speaking to me," Tea said miserably. "She doesn't even _look_ at me."

"She's young and she's angry," Blair reminded her. "And with this latest revelation it's likely that she's mourning Ross all over again."

"Before she stopped speaking to me, she accused me of making it all up in order to get Todd," Tea looked at Blair imploringly. "Do you think that?"

"I honestly don't care," Blair replied and it was true. Whatever the reasons for the misinformation regarding Dani's paternity didn't matter to her at all. "It doesn't affect me. This is about you and Dani so you either have to convince her that she's wrong or figure out a way to deal with it." _If I evolve any more_, she thought,_ I'm going to either wake up with a third eye or sprout wings_.

"I can't very well get through to her if she won't talk to me," Tea complained. "Everything I've done, I've done because I wanted her to succeed in life, to have the best things. I didn't do anything to hurt her and she acts like I plotted against her!"

Blair sighed. "Well, maybe, just maybe, instead of fussing over how _you_ did this or _you're_ being misunderstood or _you're_ being falsely accused you should think about _Danielle_."

Tea looked stunned and affronted. "I am!"

"Everything I'm hearing you say is focused on _you_," Blair pointed out. "Not only that, but I never did buy your insistence that Ross was somehow a worse father than Todd was. You said yourself that Todd was the love of your life and always would be, is it that strange that Dani would think you set it all up?"

"I _didn't_!"

"But Dani thinks you did and, right now, she's the one that matters the most," Blair said patiently. "She's the one you have to think of. It's not about how _you_ feel or what _you_ wanted or what _you_ tried to do, it's about _her_."

"You don't understand," Tea muttered.

"Right, because I've never been a disappointment to my daughter," Blair scoffed. "Honestly, Tea, what's the matter with you? When you two first got here you broke up with Victor in order to salvage your relationship with Dani. You're perfectly capable of dealing with this."

"I can't bring Ross back from the dead."

Blair nodded in sympathy. "No. No, you can't. That's true. And Dani will realize that. It's going to be hard but you will get through this."

Raised voices caught both of their attentions.

"Sounds like the brothers aren't getting along," Tea groused.

Since it did sound like an escalating argument between Todd and Victor, Blair detoured into the foyer and arrived into the kitchen brandishing a riding crop.

"What's that, Blair?" Tea cooed, a nasty smile on her face. "Leftovers from Eli Clarke? The best sex you've ever had?"

Tea couldn't pinpoint exactly _why_ she said that. Blair had just taken the time to listen to her and give her advice on the shambles that was her relationship with her daughter. Maybe it was just that Blair was an easy target for her when she wasn't feeling too great about herself. The surprised and shocked expressions as a result of her jibe she got from Viki and Cassie certainly didn't do much to improve her mood.

Blair narrowed her eyes at Tea then strode into the kitchen. She whacked Victor on the arm with the riding crop, then smacked Todd on the arm with her back swing. For good measure, she reached over and hit Tea on the side of the head. It wasn't too hard but Tea yelped.

"No. Fighting," Blair hissed, brandishing the crop. "This day is for _Jack_." She turned on Tea. "And you... Why would you even _say_ that? What is _wrong_ with you?"

For reasons entirely unknown to her, Tea didn't take the high road and apologize. She just kept slinging mud. "What? You _did_ say that Eli was the best sex you'd ever had. I was there!"

Blair just stared at her.

"Better than me?" Victor and Todd asked in unison.

"Oh, you have got to be kidding me," Blair shot them both withering looks over her shoulder.

Tea looked at Victor with a wounded expression. "Seriously? Does that bother you that she preferred someone else?"

'Hey, you're the one who brought it up," Victor shot back.

Blair smacked Tea and Victor again with her crop. "That is enough out of both of you!"

"Mom?" Jack came around the corner then and took in the mood in the room. He had actually been peeking into the kitchen for the last several minutes watching his Mom lay down the law but feigned ignorance as to what was going on. "We're almost out of Sprite and Coke... do we have any more?"

"Sure!" Blair started towards the refrigerator but Cassie was already opening it and pulling out some more two liter bottles.

Jack gathered them in his arms and considered his next words. "You know, I wouldn't be so quick to throw my Mom's past out to embarrass her, Naked Lady," he shot a serious glare towards Tea. "You're not exactly a paragon of virtue yourself. I've got stories I can tell about you."

The hush that fell over the room was significant. Blair crossed the room and escorted Jack out and back towards the basement. "I appreciate that, Jack, but you don't have to fight my battles for me."

"That's obvious," Jack grinned. "You were kicking ass in there with the riding crop. Don't they know better than to piss you off after you've spent the morning with a rambunctious horse?"

Blair smiled back. "No, they don't."

"Their loss," she shrugged. He was quiet for a moment. "Tea doesn't have the right to disrespect you in your house. I mean, she does it everywhere but I'm tired of her crap."

"I thought you liked Tea," Blair frowned.

"Early on? Yeah," Jack shrugged. "That was before I caught onto what she's really like."

"Is that so?"

"I know you don't like talking about Spencer Truman," Jack's voice quieted, "but I learned a lot from that jerk. I learned how to pay attention because grown ups think that kids are too stupid to catch onto what they're doing. Spencer was like that. So was Eli and so's Tea. You're a lot nicer to her than she deserves. You're a lot nice to a lot of people than they deserve."

Blair was stunned by that. "Jack... I'm just trying to set as good an example as I can for you kids."

"Seeing you in there not taking any crap from Todd and Victor and Tea was the best example I've seen in a long time," he hefted the soda bottles in his arms. "Don't worry, I'm not going to go out and beat people with a riding crop. I gotta get back downstairs or I'll lose my spot in line for our tourney." He paused and then looked back at her. "You're my Mom. What kind of son would I be if I didn't stand up for my Mom when someone's giving her crap?"

Blair felt like the world was turned right again.

* * *

Aside from tensions from one branch of the Lord tree, the party was a rousing success and the team of boys even cleaned up after themselves before they all went home. When Starr returned with Hope and Sam they claimed what few leftovers there were and traded stories back and forth about their day. Hope and Sam could barely contain themselves after a day at the aquarium and Starr had tales to tell about the two of them making faces at the fish. Sam was filled with excitement over the sharks and announced he wanted to be one for Halloween.

"I think that can be arranged," Blair smiled. She nudged Jack with her foot and continued. "And now that we're all here, Jack has an announcement to make."

Jack's eyes lit up. "We're moving!"

The surprise from everyone was worth the secrecy as far as Blair was concerned.

Jack began going into detail about the Capricorn building and the high tech security system that Blair had set up as well as the house itself.

Todd listened to Jack's description and realized that Blair had been working on this for some time. He could barely contain his excitement, either. _Finally_! Blair was getting out of Dorian's mausoleum for a place of her own! He had wondered how he was going to broach the subject with her given how stubborn she could be about the Cramer manse but this was better than he could have hoped for!

Cassie started laughing. "Well, I guess that means I'll be taking over the care of La Boulie! Works for me. No wonder you didn't mind me showing up out of the blue!"

"I am _always_ happy to see you, Cassie," Blair insisted. "Granted, the fact that you announced you were here for the long haul took one concern off of my mind."

"Don't get too comfortable," Cassie grinned. "Mother is not going to be happy about your leaving."

Blair shrugged. "I'm not about to _not_ do this. When we all go and see the place you'll understand." She turned her attention to Starr. "I've planned something particularly special for you, sweet girl."

"Really?"

Blair nodded. "You're going to be in the same building but you're going to have a completely separate apartment. And wait until I show you how it's going to connect."

Starr's interest took an obvious hike. "Mom? What are you up to?"

Blair looked inherently pleased with herself. Jack continued describing the place to Sam who paid rapt attention and peppered the conversation with 'Cool!' and 'Awesome!' at the appropriate times.

Todd felt a particular stirring. Blair had been amazing all day long; from when he met them at the stables to when she was whacking people left and right in the kitchen with a whip while Viki looked on to now listening to Jack describe the house she was creating for her family. Words to a song started floating about in his head to describe the day. Sure he had to deal with Victor and Tea but, all in all, the pluses far outweighed the negatives.

He hoped there would be room in that new house for him.

Gazing at Blair as she listened rapturously to Hope describing the fish she saw that day, he would make absolutely certain that there would be. He didn't survive years in that hold only to be kept outside while his family moved into their new home.

No way in hell.

* * *

Blair wasn't certain she was hearing right as she drove Todd back to Viki's later that night. It seemed like Todd was humming. She glanced at him as she drove to see if that is what was going on.

The hum stopped when Todd started talking. "I've gotta say it, Blair, watching you beat Delgado with a riding crop might be one of the hottest things I've ever seen."

Blair thought to herself that she probably shouldn't have enjoyed wielding the whip as much as she did. "Well, you and Victor got some shots, too."

"You know, you probably could have made a hell of a living as a dominatrix."

"That's... sweet?"

Todd laughed. "Today was a good day."

"Yes, it was."

"Jack seemed really happy."

"Yes, he did."

"And what was all that about calling Delgado 'Naked Lady?' Do I even want to know about that?"

Blair laughed. "Oh, just..." she laughed some more at the memory of Tea walking into Victor's house and ripping open her coat to show off that she was wearing some barely there underwear, not just giving Victor a show but her and Jack as well. "Bad timing."

"Jack was stepping up for you."

"He sure was," Blair said softly. "That was nice. Really nice."

"So..." Todd hesitated. "Was Delgado right? This Eli guy was the best sex you ever had?"

"You really want to have this conversation?"

"I'm a big boy, Blair," he assured her. "I can take it."

"Eli was a hell of a lover," Blair began after several moments of silent consideration. "At the time, I just needed something completely uncomplicated and probably a little bit dirty. He was younger than me and didn't seem to have any issues regarding dominance. He could take control or completely give it up. He was physical, very physical and very enthusiastic. Yes, it was easily the best sex I ever had."

She glanced at him again as they pulled into the driveway of Llanfair. When she turned the car off, she undid her seatbelt and shifted to face him. "Don't misunderstand, Todd."

"How can I possibly do that?" It hurt. There wasn't any way to describe it. It hurt to hear that Blair had a lover that she considered better than him. He'd always had some misgivings about his ability to please her and had from the very first but she had always seemed satisfied with their sex life. She had told him before that the only complaint she could make was that she never got enough of him. But hearing about this...

"Sex is sex," she said frankly. "You and I... were always more than that."

He turned to meet her eyes at that. "What do you mean?"

"There's sex," she gestured with her hands putting something in one slot. "And then there's us." She moved her hands to signify another slot. "We weren't sex. Even when we were just friends, Todd, even before I ever realized I loved you, what we did was making love. It was never just sex."

"You could just be saying that."

"I could be," Blair nodded. "But I'm not. You were always special. Eli was great but no one has ever made me feel the way you do." She smiled at him and got out of the car.

Todd started humming again.

"What are you doing?" Blair asked.

"Just a perfect day," Todd half sang, half spoke as they approached the front door. "Problems all left alone. Weekenders on our own, it's such fun. Just a perfect day," he drew her closer to him. "You made me forget myself. I thought I was someone else," he touched her lips with his fingertip. "Someone good.

"Oh, it's such a perfect day," Todd smiled at Blair's wide eyed surprise at him. "I'm glad I spent it with you. Such a perfect day..." he swept her into his arms, pinning her against the front door of Llanfair and kissing her hard, plunging his tongue into her mouth and feeling, with great satisfaction, her fingers digging into his shoulders as she clung to him. When he released her, sweeping her away from the door, she staggered back a few steps.

"You just keep me hanging on," he finished, opening the door to disappear inside. "You just keep me hanging on."

Blair wandered back to the car feeling more than a little dazed. She leaned her forehead on the steering wheel and sang to herself. "You just keep me hanging on."


	33. Chapter 33

Serenity Springs was regionally well known for its natural sulfur hot springs. Blair figured she might have found a way to come to terms with visiting the place just for that even if her old rival Luna was long gone and Max was a continent away. Even if that weren't the case, Serenity Springs being a monument to their love didn't sting as much as it once did.

She and Cassie soaked in the pungent, bubbling hot water. This was her birthday present; a spa day with her favorite cousin. Todd had volunteered to stay at Dorian's with the kids all day and Blair was happy to take him up on it. She only requested the house look recognizable when she got back.

Cassie broke a jasmine scented oil pod under the water to help alleviate the sulfur smell.

"They should have scents like 'chicken' or 'beef' so you can pretend you're being made into soup," Blair laughed to herself.

"That sounds like a joke Todd would make."

Blair peeled one eye open and looked at her cousin. "Really?"

"Kind of ridiculous? Maybe a little gross? Broadly hinting at something as inappropriate as cannibalism?" Cassie nodded. "Sounds like Todd to me."

"Mmm," Blair knew that Cassie was right. She was getting back into the Todd groove and it was both comforting and disconcerting. Mostly comforting because they got along almost right from the start and it felt good to be around someone she felt so normal with. It was such a rare thing for her, to feel normal just being her.

"So, how are things going on that front?" Cassie pressed. "Jack's birthday seemed to spark a bit of a change in you."

"Change?" Blair raised her head from resting against the side of the small pool they were sharing and looked questioningly at her cousin. "What do you mean?"

"A different kind of life," Cassie said thoughtfully. "I'm not saying you're undergoing a renaissance or anything." Not yet, she added to herself. "Maybe more like new shoots of grass after a hard winter."

"Are you suggesting that I'm coming out of the winter of my discontent?"

"Maybe."

Blair was quiet. "It feels good to have him around," she said after a moment. "It feels right. He's hungry, I can tell, hungry in ways he hasn't been before and I know it's because of what he went through. Hungry for a life, for love, for tenderness and I have tried so hard to make him welcome with the kids, _including_ him because he needs it.

"But he needs more than that," she sighed. "He needs me, I know he does. He's so wounded inside because of what's happened to him and I know he needs me to help and I _want_ to help. I want so much to help because when it comes down to it, I need him, too. I feel like I've been buried alive by my own life... like the real me has been buried under the wreckage of the decisions I've made and it feels like Todd is pulling me out. Or maybe he's underneath with me and we're digging out together. I don't know, maybe I'm not making sense."

"I think," Cassie smiled, "That you should worry less about making sense and just tell me how you feel. We are two grown women who have known their share of loss and heartache and love and hope and we are sitting in a magnificent natural hot spring letting our cares melt away before we get massaged and facialed and body treatmented to our hearts' content. Blair, really, just let it out."

"That's my trouble," Blair pointed out. "I can't remember the last time I just let it out. I've kept things closed up for so long I barely recognize the sound of my own voice."

"And?"

"And Todd is the only one who ever heard me. _Me_." She continued. "Even Victor as Todd managed to do more to make me feel like I wasn't good enough than most anyone else had for years. When things went bad between Victor and I... it was like I didn't know who he was and he didn't know who I was."

"But that's normal," Cassie said. "He wasn't Todd. He didn't really know you and you didn't really know him!"

"But I thought he was Todd and that just messed me up even more."

"Now Todd is back, for real," Cassie argued.

"And I'm hearing me, and feeling me for the first time in years."

"You were never happier, or more you, than when you were with Todd."

"How come you're the only one who seems to get that?"

Cassie laughed. "Mother has way too much bad history with the Lord family to ever approve. And Mother has that way about her that... it's not necessarily what _we_ want that matters, it's what _she_ wants for us. She's such a control freak and I understand why she is but it doesn't make it easier."

"That's true."

"Plus," Cassie looked pensive. "Out of all of us, Blair, you're the only one who has that One True Love."

Blair looked skeptical.

"I've loved," Cassie pressed on. "And I've loved deeply but I've never had that one man who is so far and above all others that everyone else is a distant second place. Neither has Kelly. And Mother certainly hasn't. As much as she's loved, and she has, she's always been able to move on and find another so she just doesn't understand what Todd is to you and how you feel about him."

Blair splashed some water on her face to cover up the tears that were forming. "So why aren't I jumping in with both feet?"

"You tell me."

"I used to be a lot braver than this," Blair scrubbed her face with her wet hands. "I've just been beaten down so much because of bad decisions."

"Is Todd a bad decision?"

Blair considered that. She and Todd had done a lot of damage to each other and though she may have told him at times that she regretted meeting him when the hurt was so strong she was drowning in it she never truly wished she hadn't had him in her life. It wasn't just the kids, it was more than that. He had hurt her more than anyone but he had loved her more than anyone, too.

Now? Just thinking about his smile made her feel warm from her head to her toes.

"No," she reasoned. "I think... I think I just need something. Some _thing_ to show me that I can take this chance again. When that happens... all my defenses will come down."

"When?" Cassie smiled. "Not if?"

"Oh, it's going to happen," Blair was confident. "Todd always finds a way."

* * *

"What is something that your mother loves to eat but she doesn't allow herself to eat it very often?"

"She loves lobster," Starr said.

"Yes," Todd said patiently. "But she doesn't eat that because it might kill her. What's something she loves that she doesn't eat because she doesn't give herself treats very often?"

"Steak," Jack said. Starr nodded.

"Good," Todd looked pleased with himself. "I've got a chef coming in to make up an amazing steak dinner for her when she gets home."

"Then why did you ask?" Jack frowned.

"Because I wanted to make sure it was still that." Todd clapped his hands together. "Okay, I've got balloons coming and we've got a banner to hang."

"Gold balloons?" Starr asked in a teasing sing-song voice.

Todd fixed his daughter with a stern look. "Those are for weddings, not birthdays."

Jack rolled his eyes at his sister. To say she was obvious would be an understatement. He turned his attention to his younger brother. "What are you doing?"

"I'm picking out things I want for my new room," Sam said. "Mom loves to shop so that's my present to her."

It was hard to argue with that sort of logic. Todd laughed out loud. "You've got your Mom pegged, Sam," he said to the boy. "But you did make her a card or something, right?"

"Yes," Sam's voice carried a slight irritated tone as he was pouring over a selection of beds in the catalogue he had in his lap.

"So what's the deal with you?" Jack asked Starr. "Mom said she had a different set up in mind for wherever you're going to live."

"I'm getting my own apartment in the building," Starr said proudly. "We're going to buy it through my trust fund and it's going to be connected to the main house by a secret passage."

Those were magic words. Jack looked particularly intrigued and Sam tore his eyes away from bunk beds and computer game chairs to focus on his sister. "Secret passage?"

"Yes, a set of stairs secreted away," Starr couldn't keep the expression of delight off her face. "She's basing it on the _Clue_ game."

Todd started laughing. "Well, God knows you had a hell of a fascination with that game... not quite in the way it was intended, though."

Starr had the good grace to look somewhat abashed, especially when her brothers turned curious eyes on her. "I plotted ways to kill off everyone in the game using the secret passages."

Jack huffed. "So, Starr was plotting mass murder and that was cute?!" Starr got away with everything as far as Jack was concerned.

"She was five," Todd pointed out. "And it was a board game. If she had continued with her serial killer ways heading into her tween years we would have done something about it. As it was, she was being creative."

"Yeah, right," Jack grumbled.

"Oh stop it," Starr have her brother a shove on the shoulder. It didn't result in much. Jack was growing every day, it seemed, and she had ground to a halt. She had not been blessed with her mother's willowy genes and seemed, instead, to take after Aunt Viki, Aunt Tina, Aunt Dorian and Grandma Addie in height. "It wasn't even remotely as weird as it sounds."

"It was a _little_ weird," Todd admitted. "But I was certainly not encouraging you to go down a cleaner path with the games I used to make for you." He shrugged. "I learned my lesson after you made up a big hairy man with a stick after Jack was born because you weren't getting all of the attention. That and trying to sell him in the park."

Jack shot an accusing look towards his sister. "I _knew_ you weren't so perfect little princess as you tried to make yourself out to be these last few years."

"Hey, at least I'm not on probation!"

"You were almost sent to juvie when you were thirteen! You ended up on community service and then you defaced a _hospital_!"

"Okay okay _okay_!" Todd waved his arms and waded between his warring children. He took a gander at Sam, who was watching his siblings fight with vastly amused expression on his face. "Do I really have to mediate over an argument over who got in trouble with the law at an younger age? Am I even _surprised_ by this considering you're both my kids?

"Let me make one thing very clear: you all may be the spawn of something unholy because of me, but your mother is the one who raised you and took care of you and protected you and even taught you actual values! And it's her birthday today and I am not going to have her come home to kids squabbling over who may or may not have been sent to juvie first! Or any other comparisons of law-breaking!" He gave Jack and Starr the sternest of glares he could muster. "Hang the banner for your mother over the fireplace. _Together_!"

The doorbell rang and he went to answer it._ If this is what Blair's been dealing with on her own for the last several years... damn_. He opened the door to a small handful of people with balloon paraphernalia. He directed them into the living room and told them to go nuts. As they started, the doorbell rang again.

The chef had arrived and Todd took him and his crew into the kitchen to get dinner going. Todd went back to keep an eye on Starr and Jack. They kept taking little potshots at each other but it didn't escalate the way it did before. It was strange for him to realize that he had three siblings of his own and hadn't grown up with any of them. He wondered what it would have been like to have an older sister, or two, around and even a slightly younger brother.

_But who would have raised us?_ He thought. _Tina didn't even meet Viki until she was a teenager and then Viki was basically made to be her mother figure. It's not like the four of us were ever going to grow up together and even if that were possible, the idea of being raised by Victor Lord is worse than what I actually had._

Some things were better left as they were. He had been raised as an only child so he wasn't even certain how normal Jack and Starr's squabbling was. He'd have to ask Blair. She had spent time in loads of places with an overabundance of children. She never liked talking about her early years and Todd hadn't pushed too hard. It was pretty much unspoken that she didn't have very many good stories to tell. He understood that. His childhood wasn't exactly a nice one, either.

It seemed to run in his family.

Looking at his kids, and he noted again that he seemed to be including Sam among them without thinking about it, he had to say that they had it much better than either he or Blair; which was exactly what they wanted when they got married all those years ago. He had to give all the credit to Blair, though. Even when he was around, he wasn't exactly a model of fatherly ideals.

It was different now. He wasn't going to let his own issues destroy his kids. Blair hadn't; she had fought hard to give them security and love and even if she had failed on some scores, Todd was willing to bet that she had more victories than failures. He knew what it was like to be afraid and alone and feel completely unwanted and worthless and for whatever one could say about the three kids Blair had raised, they seemed to be very secure in the love their mother had for them.

That counted for a lot and he wasn't going to let her fight those battles alone ever again.

* * *

"You know, I could get used to this," Blair planted a kiss on Sam's cheek as she thanked him for his gift. The handmade card was sweet but she laughed heartily over the furniture catalogue with earmarked pages and circled items. Sam's youthful scrawl announced: It's time to shop! All of the kids seemed excited about the move and she was thrilled with it, too. They had taken one trip earlier in the week to get a look at the space and they had oohed and ahhed over it, racing about and exploring everything they could. Blair had a few secrets left for them and would wait until they all moved in to reveal them.

Blair was feeling pretty good. She and Cassie had a magnificent spa day, her muscles felt worked over in the best of ways and her skin felt fresh and new. She was stuffed full of delicious steak. Todd had brought in a chef who really knew how to cook a ribeye. Sure, the tenderloin had the buttery, tender quality to it but the ribeye was where the flavor was. Dinner had been delicious and the living room was festively decked out with a banner and balloons. Their meal had been boisterous and now she was receiving gifts from her kids.

Jack had given her a beautiful cuff bracelet that looked like a peacock feather wrapped around her wrist. Starr had given her Egyptian styled chandelier earrings that dripped with lapis lazuli. Her kids did know she loved jewelry and singing at the club gave her lots of opportunities to wear them. "My children have amazing taste."

"Can we have cake now?" Sam asked impatiently.

"There's one more present," Todd replied softly.

"Todd, you didn't have to get me anything," Blair told him with a smile.

He favored her with a vaguely insulted look. "As if I'd let your first birthday since I got back go by without something? Please." He reached underneath the chair he was sitting on and pulled out a manila envelope with a bow on it then handed it across the table to Blair.

Blair was instantly hit by the memory of walking into the living room of the penthouse they shared before they bought theirs and seeing an envelope with a bow and her name on it. "Did you buy me a building?"

Todd shook his head. "No," his voice was almost too soft to be heard.

Her heart was pounding and she wasn't exactly sure why. She opened the envelope and pulled out the folder that was inside.

The changes on her face told its own story. The expression of curiosity gave way to confusion. The familiar wrinkle between her brows appeared as she opened the folder, her eyes scanning quickly over the papers inside.

"Mom, what is it?" Starr asked.

Blair got off the chair she was seated in and walked away from the group, engrossed in the paperwork she had. She flipped through the papers and her breath hitched. She clapped a hand over her mouth and sort of sank down to a half squat, then straightened, then sank, then straightened again.

Cassie got up off the couch and rushed to Blair's side, looking at the papers in her hand. Immediately, her brow furrowed as well and as she shuffled through the papers her jaw dropped. "Oh my God..."

Starr, Jack and Sam looked utterly confused. "What's going on?" Starr asked.

"How did you do this?" Blair asked softly.

Todd stood up. The expression on his face was deeply emotional as he watched Blair take in what he had given her. His eyes were soft, almost teary, and a trembling smile danced across his lips.

"What did he do?!" Jack demanded, not certain what to make of the adults at the moment.

Starr went over to where Blair and Cassie were to see for herself. She peered at the papers. "Daimler Designs? What is that?"

All eyes focused on Todd, then on Blair, then back and forth again. Blair and Todd were only staring at each other.

Starr looked at Cassie and said in a softer voice. "What is it?"

"It was your mother's jewelry company."

"I didn't know you had a jewelry company," Jack said.

"It was before any of you were born," Blair finally spoke, her voice trembling with emotion. "It was before I even met Todd. How... how did you _do_ this? I never thought I'd see any of this again. I never even _dreamed_ it..."

"I know," Todd replied softly.

"I never dreamed... this is... I never expected..." Blair was at a complete loss for words.

"Happy birthday, Blair."

Blair felt like her entire world had shifted. Something she had given up on completely, to the point where she didn't even think about it anymore, had just been returned to her. She'd been waiting for something to tell her that it would be okay to jump in and what she had gotten was more than she had ever thought possible.

Cassie noted the tension between Blair and Todd. Certainly not a bad tension but it filled the room with electricity that was going to blow at some point. "Let's go get some cake and ice cream!" She herded the kids out of the room so the two could have a moment between them.

"I'd say I can't believe you did this," Blair said softly once they were alone, "but you've always given the best presents."

Todd thought that was debateable. As far as he was concerned, Blair's first Christmas gift to him could never be surpassed.

"The last time I was this blown away was when I saw you standing there at the movie premiere."

"You like it?" Todd noticed that Blair was moving towards him and considered meeting her halfway. He liked the look in her eyes, though, so he waited her out.

"It's amazing, Todd. I never thought I'd see any of that again. Even my designs are in there. It's like... it's like something gone for so long... come back... just like you."

Todd felt his throat tighten. The walls that Blair had built around herself were disappearing before his eyes. He had forgotten what it was like to get the full force of her attention and it was making him a little delirious. He had gotten so used to her holding back he wasn't sure what to do with himself. He had ideas but he didn't think they could get anywhere with Cassie and the kids just in the kitchen. "I... I wanted to get you something that was... you."

"You're going to have to tell me how you managed it," Blair whispered, standing so close to him that the tips of her breasts through her sweater brushed against his chest. "I'd like to hear it."

"Okay."

She kissed him then. Her hands clasping his face and her fingers teasing his earlobes. Her kiss was powerful and unchecked. For the first time since he had returned, she wasn't holding anything back and the effect was dizzying. To have her in his arms, without a bullet hole in his shoulder, without her pushing or pulling away... was everything he had been dreaming of.

They kissed for several moments just letting their mouths melt against the other. When they finally parted, Blair caught her breath. "Okay... you're not staying here tonight. Just so you know."

Todd blinked at her.

"It's too soon..."

"Too soon for what?"

She gave him a playful look. "Just let me get my feet under me, Todd."

"When you get your feet under you, you usually run away."

"I'm not running away. I'm just saying not tonight."

"When?"

"Soon."

"That's vague."

"It's better than never."

"It's not as good as now."

She reached up and lightly ran her thumb against his bottom lip. "Very soon."

* * *

After cake and ice cream, and after burning off some of Sam's sugar high as a result, he was finally corralled into bed. Jack and Starr were looking at Blair's designs while Cassie and Todd told tales of Blair's ability to style and create amazing things. Whether it was Daimler Designs or Melador, Blair had been able to make things beautiful and interesting.

Blair was flush with the praise. When Todd talked about the ring she had made him, their eyes met and everything else melted away.

"You know," he said gently. "Christmas is coming up. Just throwing that out there."

She smiled at him, already thinking of a new style for him. One that was maybe showing signs of distress but still strong and bold. And always one of a kind.

Jack made an impatient noise. "If you two are just going to make eyes at each other all night, I'm going to bed."

Starr punched him on the arm. He shoved her back, toppling her off the couch.

"Hey hey hey," Blair said sharply. "Enough of that."

"So are you going to make jewelry for all of us?" Starr asked as she sat back down on the couch, closer to Jack to annoy him.

"Well," Blair looked hesitant. "It's been a long time... we'll see. Anyway, I don't see the boys getting anything like that until they tell me they're interested."

Jack looked immensely relieved. "I'm going to bed," he gave Todd an uncertain look before leaning down and kissing Blair on the cheek. "Happy birthday, Mom."

"Thank you, handsome," Blair smiled at her son. When he left, she looked at Todd. "Let me walk you out."

Todd didn't seem particularly interested in that but grudgingly got up to follow her to foyer. As she got his coat, he watched her closely. "Today was good, wasn't it?"

"It was," she held his coat out to him.

"I could be here all the time," he told her. "That wouldn't be so bad, would it?"

Blair didn't think it would be, actually, but there were a lot of things that had to be considered. Jack, most particularly. "I just need a little time."

"It's been, like, an hour," he couldn't help the grin that spread across his face. The resolve to keep him at arms length was gone. He could see that.

She laughed lightly and shoved the coat at him, tucking it under his arm so he'd have to take it. "I would suggest you get some rest."

"Really? Why's that?"

"Because when the time comes, I'm going to wear you out and wring you dry."

Every fiber of his being seemed to wake up and focus on her. "Blair..."

She kissed him lightly and pulled away, letting her hand slide down his neck. "Very soon."

Did she know what she did to him? Todd had to believe she had some idea but, at the same time, he didn't think she knew just how deeply and profoundly she affected him. He leaned forward and kissed the hollow of her throat. "Good night."

Blair leaned against the door after he left. "Very soon..."


	34. Chapter 34

Not even Blair thought that 'Very soon' would mean two mornings later.

Jack was growing like a weed and Blair picked him up after school to get him some new shoes and clothes at Logan's. Shopping for high school boys wasn't that difficult. Jack's collection of t-shirts and Henleys was varied and all they really needed was a selection that his arms didn't stick out of awkwardly. He also needed some dress shirts for when he worked at The Sun.

Jeans, slacks and shoes were the bigger issue. As they shopped, Jack ventured to ask about Daimler Designs.

"I don't understand how you lost it if it was yours."

Blair sifted through racks and piles of jeans. "I didn't lose it, Jack. It was... taken away."

He planted himself in view of her peripheral vision and she recognized the stubborn stance he took. She sighed. "I was married to Asa Buchanan about a million years ago. You know that, right?"

Jack shrugged. He knew it in the academic sense but he had never spent much time around Asa Buchanan or much of the Buchanans in general. Blair being married to an old cowboy was an abstract thought at best.

"It wasn't a happy marriage," Blair explained. "Not in the slightest. I didn't marry him because I loved him or I wanted to... I married him because I had to."

It didn't look like Jack really understood and a strange something in Blair was happy about that. She looked at her son and almost burst into tears. She hoped he would only ever consider marriage or any kind of relationship for actual feeling rather than necessity. "Like when you and Da- Victor got married the last time? You said that wasn't for love."

Blair shook her head. "We weren't being entirely honest. We were trying not to have it be about love. It didn't work."

Jack raised an eyebrow but shrugged. "It wasn't like that with Asa, though."

"No," Blair was happy to get back to a far less complicated situation. "Like I said, it wasn't a happy marriage."

"Marriages between gold diggers and the rich old men they seduce usually aren't," another voice cut in.

Blair guessed she should have known. For her entire life there always seemed to be someone within earshot eager to make their opinion of her heard. She wasn't exactly expecting it to be Bo Buchanan, though.

Bo, for his part, was feeling deeply out of sorts. His own son, Matthew, was still in the hospital after what could easily be understated as a very bad year. He had wandered into the junior boys section of Logan's for reasons he couldn't explain except maybe to idly think about the upcoming Christmas season. His mind couldn't help but wander down a dark path, questioning if Matthew would be out of the hospital or even awake by then.

He had intended to ignore Blair and Jack when he spotted them but when he heard his father's name he couldn't help himself. He had his own issues with Asa; theirs was a long and complicated relationship that he couldn't reconcile even this long after his death. His own trouble regarding his two sons in David and Matthew mixed with his feelings regarding his father and the words were coming out of his mouth before he could stop them.

"Seduce?" The word came out of Blair's mouth like poison; the very word in reference to his father tasted horrible. "Should have known you'd see it that way."

"Is there another way to see it?"

"There's always two sides to a story," Blair said quietly. She didn't like how she was feeling. She liked Bo butting into a conversation between she and her son even less. Something loomed over her, something she wasn't quite sure she'd be able to control, something Bo was about to unleash just by being a Buchanan.

"You know, Blair, this vendetta you had against Pa... was it ever worth it? Wouldn't it have been better to just call a truce and figure out a way to get along?"

Blair wondered if Bo was saying that for Jack's benefit. Was he trying to impart some wisdom on her son right in front of her?

_As if I'd call a truce with the man who raped me._

The words buzzed in her head and she focused on the clothing rack in front of her, sifting through the hangers without really seeing anything.

It took a moment for her to realize that Jack and Bo were both staring at her with mouths agape. It took another moment for Blair to realize that the words that were buzzing in her head had actually come out of her mouth.

"What the _hell_ did you just say?" Bo demanded.

Blair seized Jack by the sleeve of his shirt. "Come on, Jack. We have to go."

Jack offered no resistance. He took in his mother's pale countenance along with the words that seemed to come unbidden out of her about Asa Buchanan and knew that a storm had just hit. He kept looking over his shoulder to keep tabs on Bo. He didn't think the Police Commissioner would do anything but Jack had only one thing on his mind at that moment: protect his mother.

When they were in the car, Blair pressed the heels of her hands against her eyes. "Oh, I shouldn't have said that, I shouldn't have said, I shouldn't have said that." she chanted.

"Mom?" Jack said hesitantly. "Mom, are you okay?"

"Sure!" Blair replied brightly. She glanced at her son mournfully. "I... I'm not sure what to say right now."

"Is it true?" Jack asked. "What you said about Asa?"

Blair gripped the steering wheel. She hadn't turned the car on yet but she didn't really know what to do with herself at the moment. "Yes," she whispered.

Jack felt like he had been punched in the stomach. "Does anyone know?"

"Well, you and Bo know now," Blair sighed. "I've got to get you home, Jack. I've got to get to your father and tell him... he needs to hear it from me."

"Why didn't you tell anyone?" Jack remembered the conversation he had with Starr. The way Starr said that their Mom just buried the bad things and kept on going. He knew how much Starr had let Cole get away with because of what their father had done to his mother... clearly, Cole never knew that Blair had a similar history. Apparently, Starr didn't even know.

For once, Jack wasn't happy to know something first.

"It's a long, complicated story, honey," Blair told him as they headed back to Dorian's. "I've just got to do some damage control here, okay? I'm sorry..."

"Don't be sorry, Mom." Jack didn't want to hear his mother apologize for being raped or actually saying it out loud. He hoped Todd wouldn't be angry at her for not telling him about this.

He hoped his Mom would be all right.

* * *

Blair called The Sun and found that Todd had left a little early and was headed to Llanfair as his first stop. She could only hope she'd get there in time. She had to assume that Bo ran right to Clint with this information... probably stopping to get Nora in on it. Logistically speaking, Bo was probably going to beat her to Llanfair but not by much.

If he was still spilling all to Clint, then she could get to Todd first and he wouldn't be blindsided by this sort of news from the worst people he could hear it from.

_At least it's not Max spilling the beans this time_, she told herself with a humorless grin. _Nice, Blair, focus on that. You sound ridiculous even to yourself_. She was still mystified at how this had come out at all. Was it Todd unearthing Daimler Designs that had unearthed the rest of it as well? Her hatred for Asa was well known but no one really knew why. They all assumed that it was because he had dumped her without any kind of settlement which no one thought she deserved because she had been a cheating gold-digger anyway.

None of them knew the real story. None of them _wanted_ to know. They just wanted her to be the Jezebel and so she was. She knew none of them cared and she knew that trying to prove otherwise was pointless.

There was a reason she hated this town until Todd came along.

Bo's car was, indeed, in the driveway as Blair expected. She whipped around the circular driveway so her own car was ready for a quick getaway and hopped out. She didn't even bother to knock and when she entered the foyer, nearly catching a faceful of forsythia from the floral arrangement on the table that was slightly off center, she heard voices in the library.

Listening, she could pick out Bo's voice, somewhat subdued, and Clint's, stormier and louder, although she couldn't make out the words from behind the thick oak doors. Hoping Todd was upstairs, she ran up them and realized she had no idea where his room was.

She couldn't even remember being in this part of the house. She'd only ever been in the library or the living room. She wasn't ever a truly welcomed guest after all.

She peeked in open doors until she heard movement in one room at the end of the hall. Following her instincts, she opened the door and walked in.

Todd was finishing buttoning a shirt. He looked up, surprise evident on his face before smiling. "Hey! I wasn't expecting to see you here! I was just about to head over to Dorian's." He noted the wan expression on her face. "What's wrong?"

"I need to tell you before you hear it from someone else," Blair said. "It's something I've never talked about and it just came out today. I didn't even _mean_ for it to come out..." she trailed off, her gaze drifting away. She felt so far removed from herself at the moment, like she was standing apart from her own body and watching a play.

Todd found her scattered demeanor unsettling. "Blair," he reached forward and touched her arm. "What is it?"

"Asa raped me while we were married," she said bluntly. That raging gleam sparked in his eyes immediately and she realized he might have misunderstood the time frame. "While I was married to Asa, that is, not while I was married to you. I just realized that might have gotten confusing."

Of all the things he was expecting to hear, that was the last. Todd stood there in shocked silence that gave way to a cold anger. "He did _what_?"

She sighed. "You heard me."

"You're just telling me this _now_?!"

"It didn't matter, Todd."

"Didn't matter?!" He sputtered. How could it not matter? Blair _raped_? And she never said anything about it for how many years now? "I don't even know what to _say_ to that!"

She shrugged lightly.

Todd was alarmed by her blase attitude about it all. It was as if she was removed from the whole thing. He felt sick to his stomach at the mere thought of Asa forcing Blair into anything. "No wonder you hated him so much."

"I know, right?" She smiled a weird, humorless smile. "No one ever seemed to put that together. Probably because no one cared."

"Okay, okay," Todd shook his head trying to piece it all together. "You said it came out... to who?"

"To Bo," she replied serenely. "He's probably already told the family about it. I heard their voices when I came upstairs. I didn't want you to hear it from them..."

Todd was on his feet, thundering down the stairs before Blair could even blink. She was quick to follow, catching up to him as he burst through the doors to the library like a rampaging bull. He scanned the room and focused quickly on Bo and Clint. "Fuck you!" He bellowed pointing at Clint and then did the same to Bo. "And fuck you, too!"

"Todd!" Viki's hands flew to her face in horror. "What on _earth_!"

Todd shot Viki a murderous look. "Do not try your Viki crap right now," he told her. "This does not get smoothed over. No way in hell!"

"So she told you, too?" Clint remarked cynically from his wheelchair, his eyes flicking over to Blair in the doorway.. "How convenient."

"Just because you're a fucking invalid doesn't mean I won't beat the shit out of you, Clint," Todd said savagely. "You watch your mouth."

"Look, Todd," Cord stepped up. "We're just trying to figure this out, okay."

"I can't be the only one who finds the timing of all of this rather suspect," Clint pressed. "Why now? I handed over everything for Daimler Designs so you got that back. This accusation is just... ridiculous."

"No it isn't," Blair replied softly. "It wouldn't have come out at all of Bo hadn't shot his mouth off in front of my son. And, truthfully, I didn't even realize I had said it out loud. And how is the timing suspect? Todd got my company back... I'd given up on it years ago and I sure as hell wasn't going to come begging to your family for what was mine. If any of you had a decent bone in your body, you'd have returned that to me ages ago."

"Is that so?" Bo's question with laced with fatigued irritation, it was a common tone he used with Blair.

"I gave you Spencer Truman when none of you could get the goods on him," Blair reminded him. "I handed him over to you on a silver platter because you couldn't get it done yourself. When I begged for help against Margaret Cochrane you did _nothing_. And you were too late when it came to the car, too. I had to get myself out of that car before the crusher came down. Where were you? Twiddling your thumbs while that piece of filth you called a father had me shoved into a straitjacket, drugged and thrown into a padded room!"

Todd's eyes widened at that particular revelation. In one swift movement, he grabbed a glass off the bar and hurled it at Bo's head. It streaked passed him and clattered loudly against the desk that it did hit. "Be thankful I wasn't a quarterback."

"Manning," Bo's voice hardened as he reached into his jacket pocket, "you just earned yourself..."

"If you pull that badge out of your pocket, Bo," Blair's voice went steely cold, "I will shove it up your ass sideways. You Buchanans pride yourselves on being able to take on all comers but you can't seem to handle anything without whipping that impotent little piece of tin out as if it has ever meant anything except a way to protect your miserably corrupt family!"

"Girls," Viki moved to where Natalie and Jessica were standing, clutching each other's hands, "maybe you should go upstairs."

"No," Jessica said firmly. "I want to hear this."

"So do I," Natalie nodded. "Secrets have never worked out for this family too well."

For the first time, Todd took note of who else was in the library. It seemed to be a full house. Tina and Cord were standing together towards the back of the room. Clint, Bo and Nora were all gathered together. Viki hovered near Jessica and Natalie. For as many people as there were, the silence in the room was overwhelming.

"Do you all think I'm lying?" Blair asked.

There was a deeply awkward silence.

"You can say it," she said. "Go ahead. Say it out loud. You think I'm lying."

"You have to admit that you have a casual relationship with the truth, Blair," Clint said gruffly.

"I suppose you _could_ say that," she nodded. "If you don't know the whole story. In actuality, my relationship with the truth has been anything but casual. I don't suppose you all can appreciate that, up-standing truth-tellers that everyone else in this room is."

"Look," Clint shifted in his wheelchair. "It's hardly a secret that you married Pa for his money and you lied about being pregnant for his money as well. You were found out, end of story. Coming into it this late in the game with a rape accusation is..."

"Is what?" Blair asked. "Inconvenient? Silly? Pointless? You are stripping everything away to it's simplest and most shallow explanations." Blair looked around the room and decided to let it all out at last. She would explain everything, hold nothing back, and let the chips fall as they may. She took a deep breath. "I married Asa to keep my mother. You see, Dorian and I were actually enemies at the time if you all would take the time to remember. She decided that I was unfit to care for my mother which I thought was rich since Dorian didn't even know that Mama was alive until I brought her into town. I was the one who found her in that filthy, lice-ridden hole where she had spent about thirty years of her life... neglected, abused and forgotten. Did I marry your father for his money? Yes, that was part of it. But I had been proposed to right before Asa came to me... by Max. Max asked me to marry him and I said yes.

"You all think I dumped Max because Asa was rich," she closed her eyes, remembering and shaking her head. "Asa came to me and said if I married him he'd help me keep Dorian away from Mama. He'd make sure that Dorian never got her hands on my mother and take her away from me. He didn't love me and I sure as hell didn't love him but I would do anything to take care of my mother so I agreed to marry him. I thought it was a pure business deal. I didn't know what he actually intended to get out of it. Not until later."

The expressions on the other faces in the room were beginning to shift towards discomfort.

"I was meant to be a broodmare. That was my role."

Nora cast a glance at Bo, who met it with a resigned look. The truth in Blair's words was uncomfortably real.

"I played my part in front of his colleagues," she continued. "He'd buy skin-tight dresses and parade me around in front of them like some expensive whore... showing off what they clearly assumed was his virility in being able to keep a 'young filly' like me," Blair raised her hands to toss the air-quotes in, 'satisfied. He never wanted me to partake in anything except standing there and looking pretty. I imagine if one of those so-called friends had something he wanted he would have gladly sent me into their bed to play my part there. Or tried to anyway. We all know how fond Asa was of the oldest profession, don't we?

"Well, he told me enough time had passed and he expected me to keep up my end of things. I didn't even know what he was _talking_ about. He said it was time to start making a new generation of Buchanans." Blair felt her skin grow cold. There was a reason she shut down these memories. They were painful and humiliating. She had never gone the easy route regarding sex and she could have done so easily. To be viewed as nothing but a cheap whore despite that... and by these people who had no right to judge her... "I about threw up in my mouth. Just the idea... it made me _sick_...

"I put him off for another two weeks, sleeping in Mama's room, telling him she needed time to adjust, saying it was that time of the month... anything to keep him out of my bed. One night he drank a little too much bourbon... he came stumbling up the stairs and kicked my door in bellowing that he was going to take what was his no matter what."

A long silence followed.

"I fought him the first night," Blair said softly. "He pressed his forearm against my throat and plowed ahead anyway. I could barely even breathe... When he was done, quickly thank God, he had the nerve to ask me if I was all right. As if he cared. As if he gave one damn about me. What a joke. After that... I didn't fight, I just lay there as he went about his business. I didn't even look at him whenever he'd stumble in. I turned my head away and stared at the wall. I took my birth control pills every day and when he got upset at how long it was taking me to conceive I lied and said I had."

She leaned down to get Clint to look her in the eyes. "I didn't fake a pregnancy for his money, Clint. I faked a pregnancy to keep him from climbing on top of me every night. I faked a pregnancy to keep him from shoving his withered old cock into me without prelude. I faked a pregnancy to keep him _off of me_!"

Todd looked around the room, taking in the horrified faces of everyone and knew that they believed her. Listening to Blair was chilling. Her voice shifted from pure, unadulterated hate to an emotionless drone. He never understood exactly why Blair hated Asa for all those years in a way she didn't hate anyone else. Now, he understood. It made him furious and sick and desperately sad.

"But then I took that fall down the stairs and I was found out," Blair closed her eyes. "I had almost convinced him that I'd had a hysterical pregnancy but he was suspicious and he went behind my back and conspired with Dorian to have Mama committed to St. Annes. That was the end... there was no way I was going to pretend anymore. I lit into him and he started with the heart attack." Blair barked a humorless laugh. "Like it was_ so shocking_ that I hated him... his ego was astounding. I didn't try to kill him. I just didn't help him. I threw my birth control pills at him and said I'd rather slit my own throat than submit to him again and walked out.

"I was never unfaithful to him while we were married," for some reason, Blair wanted to make that clear. That for all of the humiliation Asa had piled on her, she hadn't strayed while they were married. "Not that it mattered; he just paid someone off to say I was. I didn't fulfill a bargain that I never made and he took everything from me out of revenge for not falling in line like the rest of his women. And while I was living in hell with that disgusting old man, the man I actually loved fell in love with another. Asa and Dorian made sure I was banned from any access to my mother." Blair choked up. "Everything I did to free her from that pit she was in, to keep her safe, and they wouldn't even let me say good-bye."

A long silence stretched out across the room. No one seemed to know what to say or what to do in response to Blair's tale. "Why didn't you say anything before?" Nora asked finally.

"Don't pretend like any of you would have listened to me for a second," Blair said shrilly. "None of you cared. I was a gold-digging slut, remember? I got caught faking a pregnancy for a big pay-off as far as any of you cared. Hell, Tina came dancing up to Todd to tell him all about how I faked being pregnant in order to get Asa's money. And Todd went running right back to Asa to get the goods from him. I know you got a different story from him on what happened in that sham of a marriage." She glanced at Todd with a knowing look.

"So why now?" Clint questioned again.

"Because Bo shot his mouth off one too many times," Blair replied. "He decided to air my dirty laundry at my son the way he and the rest of you have always felt was your God-given right. After _everything_..." she shook her head. "You all think you're so much better than me. How nice it must be to walk around secure that a piece of trash like me exists to make you all feel so much better about yourselves. It's really hilarious when you think about it. Your old man," she nodded at Clint and Bo, "was just a bully. And a rapist. Imagine that."

"This is ridiculous," Clint said gruffly. "An aging tramp who decides to wait almost twenty years to slander my father is not worth listening to!" He wheeled his chair towards Blair, attempting to get her to move.

Blair didn't move an inch. She leaned down and grabbed Clint's jaw in one hand, squeezing tight and digging her fingernails into his flesh as she forced his face towards her. "Your father raped me. He saw me as nothing but property and he raped me. And then he complained that his nightly rapes weren't getting the job done as quickly as he wanted." She let go and stepped back glaring at him.

As she did, she backed into Todd who had moved behind her as she talked. He reached down to clasp her hand in one of his, still standing behind her.

"Rape is about power," Blair continued. "And Asa had power over me. He held my mother over my head and the threat of her being taken away from me after everything I had gone through to find her. He wasn't the first man to paw at me because he had power over me. Not by a longshot... and back then I had to figure out a way to get some shred of power to hold onto to protect myself." She took a deep breath, closing her eyes. "None of you knows what it's like to be alone, to have no one on your side. I remember when people would talk about how brave Marty was to come forward after she was raped."

Todd felt Blair squeeze his hand as she spoke.

"I thought the same thing," she went on. "And it's true, she _was_ brave to come forward. She was right to do it. Some people didn't believe her," she nodded at Nora. "But she still had people who _did_ believe her, who were on her side, who stood by her and helped her through it. With me..." Blair faltered for a moment. "With Asa, I was alone. There was no one who would step forward and listen to me. No one was going to stand with me. Ask yourselves, honestly, would any of you have thought I was telling the truth?"

She looked at them.

"Hell, some of you don't believe me right now."

"Is that what this is about, Blair?" Nora asked. "Being brave? Asa's dead..."

"This isn't about _bravery_," Blair's voice rose. "It's about the _truth_! Something that you're supposed to believe in and fight for! And the _truth_ is that I'm tired of you all walking around acting like I hurt Asa; like I was some devil woman who tricked him into marriage so I could spend all of his money; thinking that I faked a pregnancy in order to set myself up as the lady of the house. That isn't what happened and for twenty years I let you all believe that about me because _none of you cared_!"

Todd found his anger taking a backseat to his growing admiration for Blair. She hated to be vulnerable which was probably why she had never fought against the Buchanans about what Asa did all those years ago. She hated to be weak but in telling them the truth she was letting that infamous armor down.

He felt a growing sense of pride as she stood there and faced them all down. He glanced around the room. Tina had a strangely neutral expression on her face. Cord's dark countenance suggested that he was going over things in his head and putting them together for a conclusion he didn't want to come to. Jessica and Natalie wore matching expressions of horror. They clearly believed Blair. Viki seemed resigned as well.

Bo and Nora didn't seem to want to believe what Blair said but they also didn't seem to have anything concrete to throw back at her. The only true skeptic that Todd could see was Clint.

"You fancy yourself the new Asa now, don't you, Clint? You've got the heart problems, you've started meddling in the lives of your family and causing more pain and misery with your bullshit than what might have happened if you left it all alone. From what I've heard you actually _like_ your little ex-stripper ex-wife. I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt and guessing you _didn't_ force yourself on her like your Pa did me. When it comes down to it, you're really just the low-rent, PG version of your disgusting old man."

"And I'm still wondering what you get out of all of this, Blair," Clint replied.

She shrugged. "The truth will set you free, isn't that what they say? I don't know about anyone else but I sure as hell feel free right now." Blair tossed her head and swept out of the room.

"Blair," Todd followed her, leaving his sisters and the Buchanans behind. He recognized the false bravado in her voice and wondered what was coming next. She was already through the foyer and out the front door. "Blair?"

She didn't even hesitate but got immediately into her car and started it up. Todd jumped in after her.

"That was _amazing_," he said as she peeled out of the driveway. "I mean, they had nothing to come back with! Absolutely amazing..." She remained silent and Todd decided to let her be for the moment. When they got back to Dorian's they could hash it all out. He sat back to enjoy the ride and the thought of Blair ripping the Buchanan clan to shreds.

It had been something to see.

It took several minutes for Todd to realize that they weren't going towards Dorian's. They were actually headed out of town towards the mountains. And the further they went, the more erratic Blair's driving became.

"Blair..." Todd grabbed the handle above the door as she took a swerve far too fast for his liking. "_Blair_!"

"What?"

He looked over at her. Her face was white and her hands gripped the steering wheel so hard he thought it might come off in her hands. She stared ahead but Todd couldn't be certain she was really seeing much. "Blair, where are you going?"

She didn't answer.

"_Blair_!" He shouted. "Where are you going?"

She blinked. "I don't know."

"Pull the car over," his voice rose in growing panic of her driving. "Pull the car over now!"

She swerved sharply onto a shoulder and got out abruptly. Todd double-checked to make sure the car was in park and the emergency brake was on before getting out at well. Blair was pacing like a caged animal in front of the headlights her breath coming in short gasps. Suddenly she stopped and let out a raging scream.

Todd started, then took a step forward when she stopped.

She screamed again, louder this time if it were possible.

Todd closed the distance between them, grabbing her around the waist when he reached her. She screamed again, doubling over as he held her, and two more times after that, pure rage spilling out of her until her voice was raw.

Then she leaned heavily against him and panted heavily. "I think I'm going to throw up."

Blair scrambled over to the guard rail and heaved over it. Todd followed and held her hair, rubbing her back in what he hoped was a soothing way before she sagged over the rail, utterly spent.

Todd reached forward to turn her around, tucking her under his arm as he seated them both on the guard rail. "How do you feel?"

"Like I just expelled about thirty years worth of poison from my system," she replied wearily, leaning against him.

They sat quietly for a moment and Todd watched their breaths turn to vapor in front of them on the cold night. "Are we on Llantano Mountain?"

Blair looked around. "Oh. We're on the road to the cabin."

"What cabin?"

"Our cabin."

"We have a cabin?"

"We started the plans for it when Jack was a baby, remember?" Blair got up and headed back to the car.

"Vaguely."

"Get in," Blair got behind the wheel again.

"Are you sure you should be driving?"

"You don't know how to get there and I'm fine." Blair disengaged the emergency brake and put the car in gear again. This time, she drove at a measured pace and within the hour they were pulling up in front of the cabin. "We'll call the kids," Blair said. "I can't go home in this state. Cassie's there so it should all be okay."

She unlocked the door and turned on the lights before dropping her purse and keys on the floor and sitting heavily on the couch in front of the fireplace.

Todd closed the door and locked it and then looked around. The place was done in an Arts and Crafts style and looked infinitely more stylish than Viki's kitschy cabin or Asa's antler bedecked one. He roamed around the front room and found a collection of liquor bottles. He poured two fingers of Scotch into two glasses and sat down on the coffee table in front of Blair. He handed her one glass and clinked it lightly before taking a sip.

Blair took a drink as well and then sighed. "Todd," she said wearily, her voice raw from the screaming and the vomiting. The Scotch probably didn't help, either. "I'm so broken."

He leaned forward, touching his forehead to hers. "You're perfect."

* * *

Llanfair was quiet after Todd and Blair left. The various members of the family whispered quietly to each other trying to figure out exactly what had happened. Cord stepped forward. "Can someone tell me something?"

All eyes focused on him.

"When Blair was talking about being married to Asa and the way he'd... parade her around... I want to know if that happened. I wasn't around then," he shot a mournful look towards Tina. "That's when I was missing. Does anyone remember what that marriage was like?"

"You're not actually giving credence to anything that woman says?" Clint raged. "She married Pa for his money plain and simple! So he bought her expensive dresses and showed her off in them, she _enjoyed_ it!"

Viki, Jessica and Natalie all spoke up at the same time.

"Oh, Clint, really!"

"Dad, how can you even _say_ that?!"

"What a load of _crap_!"

Clint threw his hands up in the air.

"This isn't like you and your little Kimberly," Natalie continued. "Just because you like your gold-digging tramp doesn't mean it was that way with Grampa and Blair."

"Grampa hated Blair," Jessica nodded. "He did lock her in an insane asylum, I remember that. Her kids thought she was dead and he knew that but he locked her away anyway."

"That's because she tried to kill him when they were married," Clint reminded her. "Before that..."

"Before that what?" Cord asked. "You tell me. You and Bo... you were here. Viki? Do you remember?"

"We weren't on the best of terms with Pa at the time, Cord," Bo said quietly. "To be honest, after Renee divorced him I wasn't much interested in anything he was doing. We were all in a place of mutual estrangement."

"She hated him," Tina spoke up.

All eyes turned to her.

"She hated him with everything in her," she continued. "She hated the clothes he bought her and she hated the way he'd... parade her, that's how she put it and she was exactly right."

"You remember this?" Cord asked.

"I hated her," Tina nodded. "I blamed her for losing you and I used to watch her with Asa and I could tell how miserable she was. I fed off of it. It actually helped me get through some hard times without you."

Cord smiled slightly. No one would ever accuse Tina of being too charitable.

"And those dresses?" Tina laughed. "You better believe she despised those. Asa had absolutely no sense of style and Blair, whatever else you can say about her, does. So she's in swathed head to toe in the tackiest Texas couture imaginable and her face said it all." She glanced around the room. "But no one was ever looking at her face back then. Especially not in those outfits. Face it, what Blair just told us was the truth. All of it. Everyone in this room loved Asa but let's not kid ourselves about who he was. He had his favorites," he pointed at Jessica and Viki and Nora. "But if you didn't fall under that particular category then he'd do whatever he decided was necessary to get what he wanted."

Tina looked at everyone again. "And let's be real, other than Cord, no one in this room has ever given two craps about anything Blair's gone through in her life."

"That's not true," Viki insisted.

Tina rolled her eyes. "Your interest in Blair begins and ends with _Todd_. You don't care about Blair herself. Neither do I. Neither does anyone else except Cord because he actually _did_ love her at one time. This denial is about the fact that we all know what Asa was capable of but no one cared enough about Blair to ever acknowledge it."

Cord stepped forward and reached one hand out to Tina. Surprised, she took it and looked at him questioningly. He didn't say anything but he smiled gently at her and quietly escorted her from the room.

"He's walking right into another trainwreck," Clint muttered when they left.

"Oh for God's sake," Natalie scowled. "You've got some nerve considering you're still hanging around your stripper!" She turned on her heel, red hair flying, and stormed out. Jessica followed suit and the twins stomping upstairs could be heard throughout the house.

Viki excused herself as well, saying goodnight to Bo and Nora as they also gathered their things to leave.

Clint was left in the library as Nigel came in to clean up.

"I imagine you heard all of that," Clint asked the butler.

"Yes," he replied shortly. "I arranged myself in order to hear the proceedings."

"So what did you think of it all?"

"Sir?"

Clint sighed. "Was Blair telling the truth?"

"I would say so, Sir."

Clint didn't know how to respond to that.

"It was not a relationship based on anything good, Sir," Nigel continued. "All of his other relationships, all of his other women... they gave in. But Ms. Blair never did. Mister Buchanan wanted to break her much like he did with anyone he didn't agree with. He did everything he could think of to break her. But he never did. I would say that if there was one thing he failed at, it was that."


	35. Chapter 35

"Perfect?" Blair rasped. "In what universe?"

"This one," Todd said quietly. "You're not broken. Asa didn't get the better of you. You outlived him and you finally outed him, too. You are perfect, Blair Cramer. You're perfect to me."

"Perfect doesn't feel so hot, Todd."

"Yeah, well, let it sink in." He leaned back and picked up his phone. "I'll call Starr and let her know we're staying here tonight."

Blair nodded quietly and let her head fall back onto the couch as Todd moved away and spoke in hushed tones. She heard him repeat 'Everything's fine' several times. Starr would, of course, have doubts given Todd's hushed tone of voice. If he yelled or made some ridiculous joke, Starr would probably have accepted things just fine. As it was, she'd know something was wrong.

Maybe Jack would tell her.

Blair considered that and decided that if her children managed to put aside their continuous sibling rivalry to figure out what was going on with her, maybe she hadn't done such a bad job after all.

Todd returned to the couch. "Starr's nosy," he sighed, gathering Blair in his arms and cuddling her against him.

Blair smiled ruefully, it was all she had energy for at the moment and she was trying to store some up for the confrontation she knew was coming. As good as it felt to be in Todd's arms right at that moment, he was going to ask the inevitable question and she would finally have to say the things that had long needed saying. At least now, she was coming from a place where her own experiences couldn't be questioned. Still, she wasn't looking forward to it. She was so raw from revealing this long held secret that she wasn't going to be able to censor herself and Todd had already been through so much.

Maybe he'd just hold her, and stroke her hair, and tell her he was there. Maybe he wouldn't ask...

"Why didn't you tell me about this before?"

Of course, he would ask. To expect him not to was to expect him to be someone else.

And she didn't want him to be someone else.

Blair pushed herself out of his arms reluctantly and scooted back on the couch to put enough distance between them to look into his eyes. "How much time you got?"

* * *

"Mom and Dad are up at the cabin," Starr hung up the phone. "Dad was being all quiet and weird. Something's going on. I know it is."

Cassie was pulling a casserole out of the oven. Sam was telling Hope that they were having a 'Cassie-role' for dinner because Aunt Cassie had invented them. Hope was suitably impressed.

Cassie glanced at Starr as she set the dish on the counter to cool slightly. "What did he say?"

"He said that everything was fine about a million times."

"You think he's lying?"

Starr frowned. "Well... maybe not lying _exactly_. Maybe more _exaggerating_ to put my mind at ease."

Jack knew it had to be about Blair's revelation from earlier. He glanced at Sam and Hope and knew he couldn't say anything in front of them. What could he do? Just announce that his mother had been raped in front of them? They didn't know what it meant and Sam would start asking questions.

Cassie dished everyone up and Jack pushed the food around on his plate listlessly. It smelled delicious and his stomach was growling so he took a bite. It was every bit as delicious as he was hoping but his mind kept drifting to his mother. "How long ago was Mom married to that Asa guy?"

Cassie looked vaguely surprised at his question. "Long before you were born, Jack."

"I know that," he pushed his casserole around some more. "Before she met Todd?"

"Yes, long before," Cassie nodded. "Asa was back... well, it was the first time she came to town. She left after the marriage ended and was gone for about a year or so before she came back. And it was another year or so before she met your dad."

Starr watched the exchange with narrowed eyes. "Do you know something?"

Jack met his sister's suspicious gaze and sent a significant look towards the younger children.

It didn't seem to alleviate any of Starr's trepidations. Her face reddened and her eyes widened. If there was something Jack didn't want to say in front of Sam and Hope then it was something important, something serious. That combined with her Dad's hushed tones on the phone made her acutely worried about what was going on. Especially since she didn't have the foggiest idea what the problem was.

Starr didn't like not knowing things.

"If your father says everything's fine," Cassie said calmly, taking in the Manning siblings with a wise eye, "then we're going to take him at his word. He said they'd be back in the morning?"

Starr nodded.

"Then that's what will happen," Cassie assured them. They could talk things out later when the younger ones were in bed. Until then, she just had to be the calming influence.

Which was tricky enough with these two without throwing in uncertainty about their parents into the mix.

* * *

"When _should_ I have told you about Asa?"

Todd frowned. "What? I don't know! Sooner than this!"

"Yeah," Blair was deeply skeptical. "Not when we first met. Not when we were getting to know each other. There was no point in there when it would have been a good idea to whine about my marital rape to my friend. I sure as hell wasn't going to tell you about it when we were first married."

"Why not?"

"I'm sure I don't need to point out to you that you've got serious issues when it comes to sex," Blair said matter of factly.

"No," Todd replied ruefully, he knew he had them but it bothered him when Blair brought it up. He didn't like the idea of her thinking of him that way.

"It was hard enough to get you into bed sometimes," Blair remembered. "If you knew I'd been raped... please, you would have run so far, so fast."

Todd shook his head. "No... I wouldn't have."

"You probably would have told yourself you were protecting me."

Todd scowled fiercely.

Blair's weary, wry smile was the response to that. "You know I'm right."

"I could have helped you... maybe," Todd tried feebly. He really didn't know what to say to all of this. She probably was right about distancing himself from her if he knew she had been a rape victim, too. But another part of him couldn't believe that anything would have kept him away from her. She was Blair. She was his. He believed down to his soul that they were meant to be.

"Anyway, Asa was my problem, not yours," Blair reminded him. "And given your weird relationship with Marty there was no way I was going to tell you about Asa. I hated him. End of story."

_Weird relationship_? Todd knew that Blair had always resented Marty and a lot of that was based on his relationship with her but she was definitely putting it forward as a negative thing. "You know," he said carefully. "There's nothing wrong with my being sorry for what I did to Marty. Most people would think that my being sorry about it is a _good_ thing. That's not weird."

"It's not weird to be sorry," Blair agreed. "It _is_ weird to be so involved in your rape victim's life that you're willing to give up anything to show her how sorry you are. It's even weirder how involved she was in your life."

"God, you're still pissed off about Ireland..."

"Aren't you?" Blair asked. "Seriously, aren't you a little angry at how things went down? Have you ever, _once_, been angry that Marty asked you to stay and take care of Patrick for her? You missed Starr's birth, Todd. Doesn't that make you angry? It sure as fuck makes _me_ angry! But you won't allow yourself to be angry at her because you got angry once and did this horrible thing to her! You can't have an honest emotion about her because that!"

"This... shouldn't be about Marty."

"Why not?" Blair demanded. "You want to know why I didn't tell you about Asa? You don't think that your over-involved relationship with Marty is a huge part of that? You don't think I never said anything to you about it because I didn't want you looking at me like you do her? As nothing more than a rape victim?"

"I don't see you as that, Blair," Todd assured her.

"Give it time," she replied sharply.

Todd stared at her for a moment and then pushed himself off the couch. He moved over to the fireplace and leaned his hand on the mantle. "You've been holding this in for so long."

"It's not as bad as you make it sound."

"You said yourself that you felt like you had purged thirty years worth of poison from your system."

"That was less about what Asa did to me and far more about everyone else... and all the shit I've swallowed from them over the years," Blair shrugged. "What Asa did doesn't rule my life, Todd. I rarely even think about it."

"How is that even _possible_?" Todd turned to face her. "Rape is one of the worst things a woman can go through..."

"There are worse things," Blair replied quietly.

The steady gaze made Todd shut his mouth with a snap. _That was the worst thing you ever did to me, Todd._

_That was the worst thing I ever did to you._

Blair had suffered through losing children in the most violent of circumstances. To her, that was far worse than anything Asa had done. And he had taken Jack from her arms, told her that her baby was dead and tried to hand him off to anyone he could find at an airport. What was Asa's rape compared to that? At least Asa had never told her he loved her.

"If I had told you about Asa," Blair said quietly. "You probably would have used it against me later."

"Blair..."

"You used everything else," she pointed out. "There was never a limit to the things you would use against me when you wanted to hurt me. Why would this be any different? Because it was rape? And you have limits?"

Todd couldn't really argue against it. He could stand there and swear that he'd never use Blair's rape against her but he had used everything else. When he was raging at her, he didn't think about the real ramifications and it was probably only Blair's own staunch defenses that kept him from getting it. She never let him see how much he had hurt her. The one time she did let down those defences he had walked away from her, left her crying on that park bench while he returned to Tea.

Why the hell would she ever have trusted him with anything about herself?

Tea stomped all over town announcing his impotence to anyone with ears. Blair kept their issues between them and he had repaid that discretion by... he shook his head. If he kept thinking about how he had wronged Blair, he wouldn't know what to do with himself.

"Asa should have done right by you," he said, instead.

"_Why_?" Blair asked. "He probably didn't even think he did anything wrong. Why would he attempt to 'do right' by me? It was enough that he stayed away from me for the most part."

"What he did was wrong!"

"And I hated him for it," Blair replied. "I hated him for that, for going behind my back and conspiring with Dorian, I hated him for paying off some guy to say I had cheated so he wouldn't have to give me a settlement. I hated him for _everything_. For paying off Max to seduce me in a god damned _wine cellar_... for playing games with shares of _The Sun_ that I had more than earned in helping you get the hell out of town because you allowed him the opportunity to buy them... for locking me up in a mental institution instead of letting me come home to my children..." She glared into space, her jaw twitching. "I hated him and that's all there was to it."

"He had no right to do any of that."

"No, he didn't," Blair agreed. "But it would have been so much worse to have him at my door acting like he was so sorry while he was still hurting me or the people I loved. There's no confusion. I hated Asa and he hated me. End of story. It was easy to move on from the rape. I had moved on by the time I walked out that door. None of this sick push and pull and over involvement and talk of eternal debts. Hell, that's _worse_."

"How?" Todd demanded. "How is it worse to actually be sorry and try to show that?"

"You raped Marty and watched while two of your friends did it, too," Blair said. "Do you really think that having you constantly hanging around, hovering over her shoulder, declaring yourself her protector helped her move past that? Because it sure as hell didn't help _you_!"

* * *

"Okay, Jack, what do you know?" Starr demanded.

The younger ones were safely asleep and Starr, Cassie and Jack and retired to the living room to discuss what couldn't be discussed before.

Jack felt miserable. This was a horrible thing to have to talk about. For as long as he could remember, rape hovered over their house like a black cloud. Marty Saybrooke and Margaret Cochrane were two spectres that never seemed to be purged and now he was going to add to that. He totally understood why his mother had never talked about it before... because it got talked about too damn much already and it never seemed to be put to rest.

"Mom and I ran into Bo Buchanan at Logan's," he began. "I was asking her about Asa and her jewelry business and he overheard some of it. He was kind of snippy and Mom..."

"Mom what?" Starr pressed.

There was no other way to go about it. Jack just went for it and decided they could figure out what the fallout was going to be. "Mom said that Asa raped her when they were married."

Starr's eyes bulged out and her jaw dropped in shock. Cassie's face hardened then turned thoughtful.

A series of exclamations of shock and horror seemed to bubble out of Starr like a fountain. She got up, pacing around the room as she spoke in truncated sentences as she tried to piece together the fragments of her own life and awareness of Asa with this new information. For Starr, it wasn't computing exactly right. The majority of her exposure to Asa Buchanan had been when she lived in his mansion with Blair and Max.

She had liked Asa. Asa even seemed to like her. Asa never liked her mother but Starr hadn't ever cared about that much because she enjoyed what she enjoyed and that was all there was to it.

"This," Cassie said softly, "is strangely unsurprising."

"How can you _say_ that?" Starr asked. "We lived in Asa's mansion! Why would Mom put herself anywhere _near_ that man after something like that?"

"She was scamming him with Max at the time," Cassie remembered. "Your mother wouldn't have any problem sharing space with a man she hated if she was screwing him over in some way. But that's not even the real issue for me. This actually fills in some holes from all those years ago. I'm going to have to talk to her when she gets back tomorrow and fill in the rest."

"How can you be so calm about this?!" Starr was near tears.

Cassie stood up and hugged Starr. "Your mother is a survivor," she said to both Starr and to Jack. "She has held this in for a long time. I'm calm because... as horrible as this must have been, you can see that it didn't break her. She's strong and she always has been."

She looked at Jack. "Are you okay?"

Jack shrugged. "I don't know."

Cassie sat down on the couch and draped her arm over his shoulders. "You can talk to me, Jack. It must have been a shock to hear."

"It's just the weirdest thing... to hear something like that about your Mom. To hear it from her."

"Imagine how Cole felt," Starr piped up. She wasn't sure exactly why she said it. It was probably because Marty Saybrooke's history with her father and with Victor and Cole's feelings about it all had been prevalent in her life for so long. If rape was brought up, she automatically thought of Marty. That was just how it worked.

It wasn't difficult to see that it was the exact wrong thing to say.

"I am _so sick_ of hearing about that stupid family," Jack hissed. "I'm _so sick_ of hearing about _poor Marty_ and _poor Cole_ and what a _horrible_ life they've had all thanks to Dad... or Todd... or whoever the hell is calling himself Todd Manning at the time! I get threatened and shoved into a closet by a couple of psychos for what? For the sake of Marty Saybrooke! Did anyone ask how I was? No, it was all_ poor Marty_!

"That woman never said _one_ word to me as long as she was here," he continued, his voice rising, "but I sure heard all about her! My Dad was ready to dump me and the rest of us, steal your kid and run off with her! Cole almost beat my Dad to death, turned you into a complete drip who couldn't seem to live without him for more than two seconds, and now, after finding out that Mom went through something as horrible as rape... you bring that roided out creep up _again_?!"

Starr was stunned silent by Jack's ferocity. Her mind reeled, trying to explain why she had said what she said. Was she so indoctrinated in the sins of her father that her mind automatically went to his most famous victim? Was she so used to dismissing her own mother that she did it without thinking?

"Are you _brainwashed_?!" Jack demanded.

"No!" Starr insisted. "_No_!"

Cassie stood up and tried to calm Jack into sitting down again.

"The other day," Jack leaned against Cassie almost instinctively, seeming to feed off of her calming presence. The timbre of his voice grew perceptively softer. "The other day you talked to me about how everyone ignores Mom and you asked me if I kept everything inside because that's what she did. You wonder why she does that? She was raped, Starr; _raped_... and you start blathering about Cole?"

Tears sprung into Starr's eyes. "Why didn't she ever _say_ anything?"

"Probably because she didn't want to admit what happened to her and have everyone say 'Oh my God! Poor Marty!' What do _you_ think?"

Starr flashed back to a very specific New Year's Eve.. She remembered her mother running down the stairs, frightened and bruised, makeup smeared and dress torn with Victor hot on her heels professing his love. Blair had pushed him away, screaming at him, voice shaking and in a near panic. What had she, her own daughter, done? Attacked her mother. The shame of that memory rocked her to her core; so much so that Starr had to sit down.

"Now, now," Cassie interjected, taking in Starr's pale face with some concern. "I think we can get answers from your mother when she gets home tomorrow. But if you want my opinion, I think I have a good guess as to why she didn't say anything."

Jack and Starr looked at her expectantly.

"Your mother learned at a very young age that she didn't have anyone to depend on," Cassie explained. "She has always been alone... always been left to fend for herself. It is very difficult for a person who has always known she had no one to count on to be able to lean on others or even ask them for help. Blair did what she's done since she was a child... she lived through it, she survived, and she put it behind her because that's the only way she knows how to keep going.

"She doesn't ask for help and she doesn't ask for support because she never had it to begin with so when the chips are down, that's what she reverts to; it's her survival instinct. It's really all she knows." She gave both kids a steady look. "But we are going to show her that we are here for her, aren't we? That we are on her side and that she can always count on us, right? Your mother isn't alone anymore and we all need to make sure she realizes that."

* * *

"The absolute worst thing I could do is forget what I did to Marty," Todd insisted.

"There is a difference between not forgetting something and letting it _own_ you," Blair replied. She took a deep breath. What she was about to say was something that had lived in her for years. The few times she had tried to broach the subject with Todd, he had brushed her opinions aside. "Do you know what it feels like to know that if Marty called you right now and said she needed you, you'd run to her side and forfeit everything in your life to appease her? Do you know what that feels like?"

Todd shook his head.

"How would you have felt if I never asked you for anything? How would you have felt when we were married if I had called Asa whenever I needed something? How would you have felt if he came running every time I crooked my finger?"

The idea of it made him nauseous, which he supposed was the point.

"You may feel you owe Marty," Blair continued, "but I don't. I don't owe her and I never did. Starr doesn't owe her. Jack doesn't owe her. Sam doesn't owe her. We matter and we don't owe her _you_ any more than you owed Asa _me_ or Renee owed him to me. What's done is done and there is nothing you can do that will ever change that."

"I know that," Todd sighed. She was right. He had spent countless hours locked up, pouring over his life and the mistakes that he had made. His obligation to Marty had become a flag he bore to prove to himself and to everyone that he wasn't that monster anymore. "I do... but-"

"She's never going to forgive you," Blair said bluntly. "You could take a thousand bullets for her, for Patrick, for Cole, for her pet dog... it doesn't matter. She will _never_ forgive you. The only thing she would regret is that you wouldn't be around for her to use if she needed it."

"Blair..." Todd shook his head. "Marty wouldn't do that."

"Do you even _know_ her?" Blair demanded. "She was not sanctified by your raping her, Todd! I seem to be the only person who gets that! And the idea that everyone seems to think that something as vile as rape somehow purified and martyred her is so obscene I can't even wrap my mind around it! Am I somehow more pure and innocent because Asa raped me? He raped me before you ever knew me, does that mean I've been innocent all this time and you fucked me over repeatedly without that magical transformation that apparently happens when a woman gets raped?!"

There was a tinge of hysteria in Blair's voice and it was growing louder. It was startling, if Todd was going to be honest. Is this what Blair thought he thought about Marty? Was it what he actually thought?

"I can't..." Todd started, trying to explain. "I can't hate Marty," he said. "I can't call her out for her shit! I can't do that, I'm not the guy to do that! Not after what I did!"

"Then stay the fuck out of her life if you can't be honest about it!" Blair screamed. "She hounded me, and hounded me, and hounded me when you were supposedly dead! She kept after me, precious, perfect little fucking doctor, haranguing a stressed out pregnant woman to the point where being around her made my blood pressure shoot up... and she was always around! When I went into labor, _premature labor_, she planted herself at my side and wouldn't leave no matter how much I screamed at her to get the fuck away from me! She had to be forcibly removed from my delivery room even though she never had any right to be there in the first place!

"She married a man she had already cheated on, then carried on with her lover because she couldn't bring herself to leave her wheelchair bound husband. Lucky for her he was faking it, wasn't it? Imagine if she had left him on her own?! She plotted with Patrick to take Brendan away from me because of _you_! She went on a goddamn murder spree here in Llanview and when she was cornered who did she call to get her out of trouble? _YOU_! Or, at least, the man she _thought_ was you!"

Todd was worried about Blair's blood pressure right now. And he was also finally hearing the things she was saying about Marty. He had never wanted to listen before because he had been mad at Blair for bring it up at all. Hearing about Marty stressing Blair out to the point of early labor, and having to be removed from Blair's side during Starr's birth when Blair clearly would never have wanted her there...

But he was wondering if, maybe, his own tactics regarding Marty and her rape were the right ones after all. Blair was making a hell of a lot of good points and it bothered him because he remembered her begging him to not let Marty use him years ago... so long ago it was when they were split up after her baby lie had been revealed. Todd had dismissed her then thinking that she didn't understand or know what she was talking about. How could Blair have possibly understood?

"Rape is a _crime_," Blair continued. "It is a crime of violence and power; it is _not_ a bond and it is _not_ a debt! There is nothing _you_ or _anyone_ can do to make up for it. _Nothing_! The best thing you could ever do is let her go and allow her to get past it because she is _never_ going to forgive you."

"You said that already," Todd murmured.

"She is never going to forgive you," Blair crossed over in front of him, backing him against the fireplace that was, thankfully, unlit. "She is _never_ going to forgive you. She is_ never going to forgive you_! _She is never going to forgive you_!"

"Jesus, Blair, I get it," Todd hissed. His mind was reeling. He had been expecting to be taking care of Blair, of holding her in his arms and crooning to her about how wonderful and strong she was. He had been hoping to kiss her worries away. He had not been expecting the wildcat to unsheath her claws and start tearing apart his walls. But he supposed he should have known better.

It was Blair, after all, and Blair's first instinct was always to fight.

"She is never going to forgive you because she doesn't _have_ to forgive you," Blair continued. "She doesn't have to forgive you because she doesn't love you. She _never_ loved you. She will _never_ love you!" Blair grabbed the front of his shirt in her fists. "_I_ love you! I do! _I'm_ the one that loves you! _I'm_ the one who has to find a way to forgive you for the things you do! _I'm_ the one who has to find a way because I'm the one who loves you _so_ much I can't even breathe! _I'm_ the one who had to find a way to forgive you after you took my son and gave him away and told me he was dead! _I'm_ the one who had to forgive you for taking my little girl from me when you were supposed to be dead! _That's_ what you do when you love someone... you _forgive_ them, you _find_ a way..." She was shaking him, tears streaking down her face, her eyes ferocious and fearful all at once. "You find a way...

"Just like _you_ found a way to forgive me when I lied to you about being pregnant," she wept. "Just like you _have_ to find a way to forgive me for not knowing that that imposter wasn't you! You _have_ to find a way! You _have_ to... because that's what you do when you love someone! You _have_ to find a way to forgive me."

The sob that came out of Todd surprised even him. He grabbed her in his arms, crushing her against him. So that was it, he thought. That's what had been preying on her. The walls that had been up were built on a foundation and it seemed, it felt like they had just gotten to that. He kept saying her name over and over and over and she sobbed against his chest. Her stormy tears were unleashed at last and he was crying, too. Finally, all that emotion came out... from the showdown with the Buchanan-Lords, the revelations, the breakdowns... finally, the tears came and Blair needed them to come out.

He didn't try to soothe her or shush her. His own tears didn't seem to want to ebb either so he figured that after so long maybe they had earned it. They needed this...

They needed each other.

* * *

"Maybe I _am_ brainwashed," Starr said to the lump that was Jack on his bed.

She knew he was awake. He was too still and too quiet and she'd tell him someday that he needed to work on his fake sleeping but now really wasn't the time.

Starr got into bed with her brother. He gave up the pretense and turned around to look at her. "You were getting brainwashed there for a little while, you know," she pointed out. "When you wouldn't talk to Mom or listen to her and decided that being like Victor was the thing you needed to be."

"Yeah..."

"You've only just started to come back from that, Jack."

"Because of Mom."

"Yeah," she nodded, "because of Mom. I know I've been the worst daughter in the world."

Jack snorted appreciatively. "You're not the _worst_."

"Thanks."

"You're not the _best_, either," he was quick to remind her.

She punched him lightly on the shoulder. "Dad always included me on everything. And some of my earliest memories... Tea was always there. I mean... maybe you have a point. Mom always worked so hard to keep me out of whatever Dad was up to. She used to tell me stories about him being a lost prince. She romanticized him so that I wouldn't hate him for not being around."

"Well," Jack huffed. "Guess she did her job because you side with him on everything. The only time you turned on him was after he knocked you down a flight of stairs."

"That wasn't Dad."

"You thought it was. We all did."

"Yeah," Starr nodded. "Mom really does go out of her way to keep us away from her own issues. If she never puts herself first is it any wonder the rest of us don't?"

"That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard in my life," Jack yawned. The stress had gotten to him and he was mentally exhausted. He just didn't care to yell and Starr was close enough that it wasn't necessary. "You're a Mom now, Starr. You tell me. Would you bring Hope into all your plots? All your romantic entanglements? All of you instant mood swings? Cole loves me! Cole doesn't love me! I hate Cole! I love Cole! I love James! I love being normal! I hate being normal! No one understands me! I hate everyone for not understanding me! I hate everyone because they understand me!" He shifted again. "When Hope starts hating you, remember how you treated Mom."

"You have no idea how much that scares me," Starr whispered.

"What have you got to be scared of?" Jack asked. "Mom is on your side and she knows what it's like when her daughter thinks she's a joke. Aren't you lucky? Mom didn't have that."

"No, she didn't," Starr realized. "Mom was really flying blind with all of us."

"You most of all," Jack pointed out. "No wonder you're so horrible."

She could hear the teasing tone in his voice and smiled into the darkness.

"You think Mom's okay with Todd?"

"Dad will take care of her," Starr said with confidence. She knew he would.

"They don't have the greatest history in the world."

"They love each other."

"So?" Jack asked. "It's not like that has ever kept them from hurting each other in the past. I know the stories."

"They love each other," Starr repeated. "That means everything. She'll be fine. Dad will take good care of her."

"If you say so."

"I do."

There was silence for awhile.

"What do you think the Buchanans are going to do about all of this?" Starr wondered.

"If they know what's good for them." Jack said fiercely. "They won't do a damn thing."

Starr nodded into the darkness, a feeling of protective pride sweeping over her. "Yeah... just let them try."

* * *

"I'm exhausted," even Blair's voice sounded limp.

"Yeah," Todd felt a little worn out himself. Emotional roller coasters took their toll. "It's cold, too."

"Let's just go to bed," Blair said wearily. "We can use the space heater and the mattress pad heater and we'll be fine." She pushed herself off him before slowly climbing to her feet.

They had collapsed onto the couch not long before, holding onto each other. Blair had already been as limp as a rag doll or Todd might have attempted some making out.

"To bed, as in... together?" Todd asked hopefully.

Blair turned to him, shoulders dropping, her whole demeanor crying out 'completely empty.' "Todd... I think we can manage to sleep in the same bed and deal with it."

"No part of this reunion with you has gone the way I wanted it to," Todd said petulantly. "First time you took my shirt off, I was bleeding out from a gunshot wound. Now, the first time I get into bed with you nothing's going to happen there, either?"

"Patience is a virtue?"

"I'm not virtuous," he grumbled but he followed her into the bedroom. She rummaged in the closet and pulled out a space heater, setting it up and turning it on. It wasn't long before the mountain chill that was settling through the cabin had lost it's sting. Blair plugged in and turned on the mattress pad heater before rummaging around more and pulling out some clean linens for the bed.

Todd stepped forward to help and soon enough, the bed had been made up with sheets, blanket and quilt. Blair produced a pair of mens pajamas still in plastic wrap. She gave Todd the pants and took the shirt for herself. She shucked off her clothes and then slipped the shirt over her bra and panties before heading out to make sure the cabin was all locked up.

By the time she returned, Todd was in the pajama pants and was pulling down the covers.

As she snapped off the light and crawled happily into bed, Blair didn't neglect to notice how good Todd looked. It was a shame that there was literally no energy in her at all. She half groaned, half sighed as she settled under the warm blankets on the soft mattress. Her eyes were already closed. Sleep was not far from claiming her.

Todd reached forward and stroked her hair. Her exhaustion was apparent and as his eyes adjusted to the darkness he let them caress the curves and planes of her face. He could tell she was gone. She was halfway there the second she hit the pillow.

"Tangerine... Tangerine..." he whispered. "Living reflection from a dream. I was her love... she was my queen..."

_Look... it's our world... it's the world that you gave me and you made me its queen..._

"And now a thousand years between..."

Sometimes it felt like a thousand years from that perfect moment in the penthouse after their perfect wedding. Sometimes it felt like it was yesterday. He could see her in the dark, now, all dusky shadows. He could remember her in the light of their bedroom, when all she had wanted was him and how beautiful she had looked underneath him as they made love.

"Thinking how it used to be," he continued whispering the lyrics to that song that had always made him think of her. "Does she still remember times like these? To think of us again..."

A million images of Blair through the years flashed in front of them, overlaying themselves onto her sleeping face. He leaned forward and gave her a feather light kiss on the mouth, breathing against her lips.

She had asked him to find a way to forgive her.

"And I do."


End file.
